



^ *■ 

_ \r j 

O * or , 

, ♦oho’ / % 

*, O V % 't * o ,. ^ 

/ 



.0 % 



> V 4 ' ^ , 

* „$•* cK 

/.o' ' 0 V 9 "° /V*»,.^ 

*fcO- \ .*♦ -V»\ 

^ 'V - ^vwy; * 




.V <p z 

**./ 9 ' ^ '*,^ 8 P/ **’ W-e 

' </ t • ■'«.>; 4 • • vV ■ ■ * ; v • • * v °; • -« ,, v • • 4 ' 

.V ZMW&' * ■' v ' - •’ 5 ». A 

* 




, •> • ,ll /s s? ' " 5 N °" 

* x'n- S. x^AjRiv S *& K? ^ 

A, r ' -iT (A * <. <?', 

M“ •*> <T '~‘ r>r!f '» ■" 





/ *W%% ° 4 c ° rWJ'. % ,0 s * v 

•o 0 X : -,. i A v 




„ _ _ 

f£r 

^> .0 

^-v a i ' ^ s $ <* , 

S .<V . s s '// - C‘ 

» % g 

T< 





^ 0 N C . - 

0 V C Q *$> 

V <. -S^\ V x&t, y . ^ 




z; 

o aV </> 

* '> J 

x &+<£&■* Q 

" A O, y 0 4 V * A 0 

. > 1 * * • "*b 0 * ■ 

■i o * 

1 * 

^o o x 

* w * 


xP <\X as 



o 


S' 

C ^ * 

-S- s » e r ^ On 0 
0 . s ^ ^ -V O 

* \\‘ 
: ^ ^ v 










> 


^ 1 I 1 4 


* f ^ v '-i> u 
•s cP * <s » -i a' 

A A - V ' 8 * ' 0 * x ^ l'..on 

^ V* »&-—:«■■/■■ ^ '^o 0 X f 

7 ^ ^ ^ 

r^f t- 

\ v 


i, 00 ^ 



0 V x^- ^ ^ 0N ° ' X 

.^' , K . -r> 

- ^ X ’ 
xP ,\V 


V ■>> /^ V ' ^ 

V 

’ z x' z 

« sy <%> 

y\ xD y u o \ <i 

A V ._ -f ^ 0 ~ * 

-f , X 

< o X 




*“ «?> ^ - 
^ oV* % 

o * k * aQ> <* \ S ’ -\ 

(Or t o N c ^ 1 * * s V 

0 - c - ^ ^ Ap .-^ x 





r .' 

° ^ v v 

- , X ^'V A 

v* . - % -. • ^ , 

' o v 1 B ^ ' o rkV' 

', • ^ x- _/v>x, 1 O 

X ^ ^ \\ N 

& * 'f J > .*rs *- 


A V 0 


X 00 ^. 


V 


,0 



v * 1 -. V" 

>■ . « X V *4*S Kv. v -<» 

\' * iA A, ^ ^ ^ 

k -i\\ /rL o 






* v> «<► - 

v ' ■ * 

40 \ nc s r-o.x 


















o CW/ 



,.0 


*>« n\ ■< 

■^o O 4 ^ >• 

" ' ^ ^ <* 

\ t * 7 r;*'> g 

> x ^\° 

* aV * A\%a/\ ° ^ ^ * 

^ <& « Mi/A ° v 

, v </> 

A* </>_ o 

‘\ v •>*. .J ‘V 


£> > V " -'' J * 
^ ♦ > N 0 > \ 

C> V 



4°' 0 * G C *A" V v A 

c?'. c LJ%^ .# v 

A ^ ‘ 


Z 


<» ", 'V A* * 

tP <\ V <B 

: ,* ^ 

u^.^ v * V? <?' * 

& ^3 'r> A ^ ■ y 

^ y 0 * X * 4° N r C, ^ 

C.° % 

c—■• \ V. r ^ 




,° ^ , 


* #WA « <?' -V; Ck- «/\^6r A, r ' /$ * 

^ ® v 

-i — < X v '</> w 'I// ft'Ci \\N * <V> *^ > . " >pfcfe^ ° o 

K- * ^ * ^\ v i 

S \^ ID 45 y 0 o jk ^ A 6 ft * s s , „ '~lr+ y 0 « X 

* v ' 8 x <• 0 c * *%* ^ v" * „ o; 

' ^' ’- '»* *'«%'- -»o 

!-*.-> J> 


C- 




o •>> N ’^' J ~ * 

, °<U ^ 3 N 0 \V ^ '«|V 

^ c y, V ^ ^ " 0 / > V 

* ^ (3 S) « JN 

2 A ~ 7 - 

o ^ ^ o 

- ^ ^ 



\° °x. , 

4 O ^ 

J- „ . x* .0 o ■ 

9 ' s s * * ' /, ^C‘ 

* 


A 

y . 1 1 * « l O ,u 

^ * *MZA!* , 0 ■• 

_ -< o o x 

0O. * * 4 ~7% ^ 

> ^ ° kV ^ ^ ___ % . 

'' ^ s .. , °V* O to % % ' 1 ,S > 

S S 7 /y O V ^ ^ 4 ' ^ 

V Jlikk 'v *0 r <? 9i « -V A» <5r 

r - C< >3 - r <4A 

° V ° < 



AV ^ 

<^ y/ 7 s s ‘ \ 

- x •#> 


k - ^ -' 

<t ^*1 1> 

5 <r CN /O 


'' ,.V a ^ # 

° a^ ^ ° V/ £ 

/* * ^ ,y * (<r ^ ^ v . 

A ^ ^ ^ oN C, ^ 

, °o 0° * C I^^ ^ 

“ \° o* 

> !>' '^. * ‘SgflW* A ■ ^ ^ 

^ NNS^r- n o. & L t /y t \ p.0 ~b ^,y -3 

, % *«»»’ -0, b. »"'* </■>-"'«% ° K ° 

"■■ c -^. , v .^' *'*$£$&'. U, ,v 

^ - V/ W - .V 

^ A oV 
. A ,CA 


z 




■fc ,0 <r 

S o N c * bp 

0° <W '/<!, A 

i ' ^ "\ , b>, " 

c ° 'A-: Vr“-vl .. ^ > 


■ : ^\’3 

A ^ 


<£, V " V ' * ^ O 

1 ^ 










































ONCE IN A RED MOON 





ONCE IN A 
RED MOON 


BY 

JOEL TOWNSLEY ROGERS / 

I) 




NEW YORK 

BRENTANO’S 

Publishers 



Copyright, 1923, by 
BRENTANO’S, Inc. 
All Rights Reserved 



« a 


C * * 
C 


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

VAIL-BALLOU COMPANY 
Binghamton and new yon if 


OCT -4 1923 

C1A700164 / ^ 


'V* 





To 

OTIS JOEL ROGERS 


from whom I have consciousness 
of all tremendous Visions, the 
eternal Mysteries, the abiding 
Laws, the dreadful Awes, the 
cruel dog-driving Fates, and 
with that consciousness courage 
to meet them all, and death, 
this book is respectfully 
dedicated. 



CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 




PAGE 

I. 

Eighteen Dollars for Death . 



. 3 

II. 

The Dog-faced Sphinx . 



. 12 

III. 

Remember Your Sins, Tim Grady! 



. 16 

IV. 

Black Tom Jefferson 



. 18 

V. 

Alms for the Poor .... 



. 26 

VI. 

The Uninvited Guest 



. 29 

VII. 

Dollar for Dollar. 



. 33 

VIII. 

The Face at the Window . 



. 36 

IX. 

Midnight Watcher. 



. 38 

X. 

Black Blood. 



. 41 

XI. 

Fallen Flower. 



. 46 

XII. 

Constable Burke. 



. 50 

XIII. 

Clay Grips the Knife .... 



. 54 

XIV. 

Into the Dark. 



. 65 

XV. 

Morning Mist. 



. 68 

XVI. 

Dictation !. 



. 72 

XVII. 

The Rich Uncle. 



. 78 

XVIII. 

The Black Cat. 



. 82 

XIX. 

Cup of Death. 



. 87 

XX. 

Murder in the Stars. 



. 93 

XXI. 

Padriac Grady Walks Alone . 



. 99 

XXII. 

“Hearts Afire” with Rose Dawn . 



. 108 

XXIII. 

Tim Grady’s Wife. 



. Ill 

XXIV. 

The Law on Hanging .... 



. 119 

XXV. 

Over the Hills and Away . 



. 125 

XXVI. 

Love Heat. 



. 132 

XXVII. 

The Face in the Red Dawn 



. 138 

XXVIII. 

Ships Put Out to Sea .... 



. 142 

XXIX. 

Lights Go Out. 



. 145 

XXX. 

The Queen of Spades .... 



. 152 

XXXI. 

Sorrow of the Dog-faced Sphinx . 



. 157 

XXXII. 

Dawn Sun. 



. 161 

XXXIII. 

Wigley Arsen at Large 



. 166 

XXXIV. 

The Gold Express *. 



. 169 

XXXV. 

Day of Doom: Dim Morning: Man 

Hunt 172 

XXXVI. 

Day of Doom: Fair Morning: Sand Fringes 176 













CONTENTS 


PAGE 


CHAPTER 

XXXVII. 

XXXVIII. 

XXXIX. 

XL. 

XLI. 

XLII. 

XLIII. 

XLIV. 


XLV. 


XLVI. 
XLVII. 
XLVIII. 
XLIX. 
L. 
LI. 
LI I. 
LIII. 
LIV. 
LV. 
LVI. 
LVII. 
LVIII. 
LIX. 
LX. 
LXI. 
LXII. 
LXIII. 
LXIV. 
LXV. 
LXVI. 
LXVII. 

LXVIlI. 

* 


Day of Doom: High Morning: Man with 

Glasses.186 

Day of Doom: Full Noon: Ghost of John 

Dawn.189 

Day of Doom: Siesta Hour: Dead Dreams 193 
Day of Doom : Departing Sun : Mrs. Mal¬ 
low’s Hate.197 

Day of Doom : Seven that Night : Name of 

the Dead!.202 

Day of Doom: Nine that Night: the 

Whispered Word.205 

Day of Doom: Eleven that Night: Scot¬ 
land Yard.208 

Day of Doom : One that Night : the Black 

King.213 

Day of Doom: Three that Night: 0 

Bloody Moon !.217 

Day of Doom: Hour of Fate.224 

Faithful, to Thee, Cynara !.226 

Morrow’s Morrow.231 

Night Whispers.235 

Quagmire Deeps.239 

Ike Duval’s Terrible Idea.242 

Tim Grady’s Money.. . 248 

Deleon Bites Iron.253 

Messenger of the Black King! .... 263 

Shadows of the Rope.264 

Death to the Dog!.273 

The Rolling Dice.276 

Howling Ghosts.281 

Women and Whisky and Wrath .... 287 

The Dreadful Hour. .295 

“Break ! Break ! Break !” 303 

Heart Blood.' . 307 

Why Those Tears, Lady?.312 

Night Rain.317 

“Good-by, My Lover!”.323 

Deep Tides Drown.329 

The Black King.334 

New Moon.341 



























PROLOG: THE BLOODY MOON 


Here, within the blood red shadows of the moon, a man 
lies dead. A knife has pierced his breast and heart. The 
knife’s haft quivers. On that silver haft a golden serpent 
is wound and wound around. Its emerald eyes twinkle 
and gleam with the fury of the moon. 

Who did this thing? Who killed this man? 

Minutes pass. Take count of them, for a soul has passed 
with them. 

The red moon sails in cloud and clear. Over the sea, 
over the shoal, over sand and rock and marsh its nocturnal 
keelson journeys. 

Shadows crawl in the darkness. The flash of a blade, a 
strale of steel, an arrow of disaster—a knife! Breath of 
murder! 

Clear and cold, her blue eyes somnolent, a woman stares 
at the sailing moon. ... A girl is crying in the night: 
“Gay! 0 Gay!” Lovelorn, whimpering: “Gay! 0 
Gay!” . . . Shapes running in the darkness. “Halt! 
Halt!” . . . 

Now let the moonlight die, and come again. Horrible 
night rolls round. The shadows are one with it. All seem 
asleep. 

The crimson moon falls far upon the marshes. The dead 
man in the moon has bloody eyes. Watch! He is laugh¬ 
ing. 

Who did this thing? Who killed this man? Who 
struck that serpent knife ? 

Here a man lies dead. Think of it! Last evening he 
drank the wine, he kissed the lips, he threatened death. 
Yes, he threatened immortality to his enemies as fiercely 
as any little god. Now his limbs are flaccid. His brain 
holds no more thought than the colon of a worm. 


PROLOG: THE BLOODY MOON 


Where are gone all those inchoate thoughts, those de¬ 
sires, fears, passions, memories? What is this which lies 
upon the narrow bed, this lump of clay ? 

Only last evening a marvel more intricate than the mul¬ 
tiple involutions of the stars—more nuclei of force in him 
than there are suns in space—a reservoir of aeon-toppling 
potentialities which could (did we but know) grip creation 
by the throat and unarm the weeping angels. 

This was God’s own image, this the promise of divinity, 
this clod. 

Nothing left now which would fetch above a dollar and 
five cents as charcoal, fat, phosphorus, iron, sulphur, salt. 
Yet he was worth ten million dollars. You can read it in 
the newspapers. 

One tick of eternity’s clock sufficed to end this life—to 
cheapen ten million dollars’ worth of man to a junker’s dol¬ 
lar, five—to smash this divine machine—to straw to limbo, 
wind, and therk night this intensity of dreams and passions 
which was once a human soul. 

One tick of eternity’s clock. Scarce would you have 
time to yawn. What is life ? What is time ? 

Dead. Dead for a ducat. Spitted through the heart. 

Who did this thing ? Who killed this man ? Who struck 
that serpent knife murderously through his heart? 

Now let the vengeful mobs howl forth! Now let the 
cruel men who hunt for men turn their dread eyes upon 
this circumstance! Now let the hounds be loosed, baying 
up the crimson moon! 

Who did it? “I,” says the red moon. “I did it with 
my bow and arrow. I killed Cock Robin!” 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


I. EIGHTEEN DOLLARS FOR DEATH 

O LD Tim Grady, the movie millionaire, sat in the 
Alhambra Palace with his son Padriac. The 
Grady super-picture, starring Rose Dawn in 
“Sin” was on the silver screen. Those lovely wistful eyes 
of beautiful Rose Dawn! Certainly they were worth 
fifty-five cents of any man’s money, including war tax. 

Police Lieutenant MacErcher leaned over the theater’s 
back seat, his legs crossed, lowly conversing with Solemn 
Ike Duval of the Argus Agency (private detecting neatly 
done). 

“That’s a cold un, that young Padriac Grady,” Mac¬ 
Ercher said with a jerk of his head. “Always figuring. 
Look at ’im now. Smart business man, I guess.” 

“Not much like old Tim,” whispered Ike, softly mov¬ 
ing his jaws. “But then, though they don’t look alike, in 
a kind of way they do look alike.” 

“Ain’t it the truth? Young Grady seems like the old 
man’s shadow.” 

In close-up ten feet high the screen showed beautiful 
Rose Dawn. Round pearl tears upon her cheeks. Mist 
gathering in her large eyes. Her mouth trembling as 
though she yearned to kiss each man in the Alhambra Pal¬ 
ace who had paid his fifty-five cents. Thoughtfully Mac¬ 
Ercher rubbed his stub nose. Solemn Ike kept silence; 
his small, cold eyes softened; he coughed behind his hand. 
Yet he was a man who knew no love of women. 

Old Timothy Grady, sitting far down front, shivered 

through all his giant frame. He clasped the chair arms. 

3 


4 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Erotic music, how it quickened hot blood within the heart! 
And old Tim had taken liquor. 

In simulated love delirium the woman on the screen 
threw her arms about her screen lover, clipped him close, 
drew his lips to her shut eyes. Throb! throb! throb! 
pulsed orchestral minstrelsy, drowning the high theater 
hall in floods of deep-noted music. 

Screen tricks, screen tricks! Only a painted passion 
for the camera. 

Old Tim Grady growled an oath, his voice raspy with 
brogue. “I wish she’d act like that for me.” 

Padriac Grady didn’t answer his father. Deliberately 
he looked at his watch. His gray eyes were expressionless. 
He had never seen Rose Dawn in the flesh. “I want to 
catch the Knickerbocker for Chicago,” he said. “The 
picture’s going big out there. We ought to make a mint 
of money‘from it.” 

Rose Dawn still lingered in the arms of her screen lover. 
The packed house was mute. Only Padriac Grady seemed 
bored. 

And one other man. He arose, stumbling over knees, 
stumbling up the aisle, staring at the carpet. The Gradys 
did not see him, nor would they have known Anthony 
Anthony of the Argus Agency. 

Ike Duval straightened up, giving a curt salute. 
“ ’Afternoon, Mr. Anthony.” But Mr. Anthony was still 
looking at the floor, intentty, pondering something. With¬ 
out a word to Ike he passed through the doors out into the 
cold gray day. 

“That your chief?” MacErcher asked, rubbing his nose 
again. “Smart looking fellow.” 

“No, he’s no fool,” said Solemn Ike. “But he’s a man 
with damn’ queer ways, MacErcher. Sometimes he’s 
almost beyond me.” 

A screen villain had seized beautiful Rose Dawn, haply 
purporting to kiss her holy lips, haply to strangle her. 
Her gold curls raveled free. She fought madly till her 


EIGHTEEN DOLLARS FOR DEATH 


5 


dress was torn. No one of the thousands watching her 
took full breath. They clenched their fists. Spencer, the 
physician, pulled his beard. Bellbender, the minister, 
tugged at his collar band. Todd, the lawyer, passionately 
mopped his bald head. The orchestra beat bass chords. 

Over a table the villain bent Rose Dawn. She seized 
something, a knife, a paper-cutter, a pair of shears. She 
struck. Tearing at his throat, the screen villain toppled 
heavily. He raised his arms. He spun on one heel. He 
fell; and so died. 

Rose Dawn stood with arms stretched, as on a cross. She 
shook her curly locks. Something of the tiger’s fury in 
her eyes! A flame; a holocaust. Quick the light died. 
She was cold again, beautiful Rose Dawn, perfectest of ac¬ 
tresses, as she kneeled to look at the dead screen villain. 

In that heavily breathing house no one applauded. 

“Well done!” whispered Padriac Grady. 

Old Tim took deep breaths. “You’d never think she 
could look so fierce that way,” he said unsteadily. “She’s 
a queer gir-rl.” 

Solemn Ike Duval put on his derby hat, preparatory to 
leaving the Alhambra Palace. ‘ ‘Them movies! ” he jeered. 
“Did you ever hear of a woman killing a man like that, 

MacErcher ? ” 

“Movies aren’t what they used to be. I liked her better 
in her first plays, ‘Hearts Afire’ or ‘Mexican Love,’ eight- 
ten years ago. Too much of this tiick acting now. She 
used to be the real thing when she was playing with old 

John Dawn.” 

“Dead stuff,” said Ike with a yawn. “What s a good 
place to get beer ? ’ ’ 

The Grady car was waiting when the Gradys came out 
of the theater. Old Tim was not yet entirely accustomed to 
his vast wealth. He surveyed pridefully the car’s dark 
green gloss, with the tiny harp and initials on its door 
panels. He made loud show of drawing on his gloves, of 
staring around him, of giving commands to his giant negro 


6 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


chauffeur as he stood with a foot on the running board. 
Padriac was nervous, impatient of the observant crowds. 
He urged his father inside. 

Tim looked about for some acquaintance he might patron¬ 
ize. ‘ ‘ How are ye, Thorn, boy ? ’ ’ he shouted to an elderly 
gentleman approaching through the Broadway throngs. 

A slight frown appeared on the gray, supercilious face of 
the man addressed, but he made no sign. 

“How are ye, Thornwood?” Still Tim Grady got no 
answer. ‘ ‘ Good after-rnoon, Mister-r Clay! ’ 9 

Mr. Clay lifted his grave silk hat. “How do you do, 
Sir?” 

“Well, I do pretty dar-rn well,” old Tim muttered as he 
climbed in the dark green car. 

He rolled away, proud of his car, proud of his giant 
black chauffeur, mightily proud of having been saluted 
publicly by a Clay, than whom, God knows, is nothing bet¬ 
ter. 

Citizens on the sidewalk stared after the Grady car ten 
minutes. “ ’S Mr. Grady himself,” said Citizen A. “Tim 
Grady !” cried Citizen B. “I don’t believe a word of it!” 
said Citizen C. “It ain’t possible. Why, that fellow walks 
or talks just like you or me.” 

Black Tom, the chauffeur, swerved the green car west 
through traffic to Eighth Avenue. Tim ordered him to a 
halt before a small pawnshop. Above the doors a gilt 
sign: “A. Bliss”; in the windows mandolins and toilet 
sets; the entrance iron-barred, looking exceedingly black 
within. This was a place much patronized by actresses, 
jobless men, and by persons who had become possessed of 
pawnable jewelry and silverware in queer, mysterious ways. 

Padriac waited in the green limousine while old Tim 
strode through the doors. Mr. Gus Bliss, the shop’s pro¬ 
prietor, left his iron-grilled cage and came with haste to 
meet Tim Grady. Tim’s mottled red-gray face was furi¬ 
ous. His lips clapped open and shut, emitting only harsh 
hisses. 


EIGHTEEN DOLLARS FOR DEATH 


7 


Bliss was a small, soft man. His doglike eyes were 
frightened. He belonged to a trade accursed; a pawn¬ 
broker is insulted, threatened, hated and despised by all 
men; none is more truly of the tribe of Ishmael. Gus Bliss 
was wary. Like the kicked cur, he was quick to show his 
teeth. It does not seem possible (perhaps only Anthony 
knew it) : in his Sephardic heart of hearts Gus Bliss wanted 
to be a gentleman and a poet. 

‘ ‘ Where’d ye get that photo V* roared old Tim, pointing 
a shaking finger. “What do ye mean showing the face of 
Rose Dawn to all the war-rid in your dirty rabbit-den, ye 
louse ? ’ ’ 

The pawnbroker did not dispute a matter of mixed met¬ 
aphors. He rubbed his hands. Tim was pointing to a 
large silver frame which enclosed a picture of Rose Dawn, 
her head lying on her two palms pressed together. 

Old Tim made furious gestures. He tore off his hat and 
rumpled his red-gray hair. His hooked nose quivered. 
The purple pouches beneath his eyes inflated like small 
balloons. By a head he topped Gus Bliss as he leaned 
over, swinging his right fist in short arcs. Old Tim Grady 
was a fighting fool, especially when confronting small men. 

“Well, Sir ,” the pawnbroker stammered. “A very fine 
gentleman left that with me, as pledge. Many fine gentle¬ 
men have dealings with me. Mr. Gay Deleon—” 

“Gay Deleon, the notar-rious gambler V y 

“Well, Sir—” 

“What does he mane selling the photo of my intinded 
wife to ye,” old Tim foamed, “like as if she was a common 
wench ? 111 have him hanged! 111 have him jailed! 111 

give him a kick! Give it here!” 

He made a lurch for the picture, wrenched it from its 
shelf, smashed the glass with his fist. ‘ ‘ Ouch! 0, mother 

Macree!” Old Tim sucked his knuckles. He tore out 
the picture of lovely Rose Dawn, stuffing it in his overcoat 
pocket. He threw down the silver frame, jumping on it. 
In swift cycle his wrath had passed from Bliss to Deleon 


8 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


to the silver picture frame. And now that the picture 
frame lay stunned and lifeless, old Tim Grady’s wrath was 
calmed. 

He smiled grimly. ‘ ‘ How much do I owe ye ? ” 

Death lingers in a second. Gus Bliss hesitated twice a 
second. In that time old Tim’s quick roving eye had 
passed around the shop, over the cheap suitcases, the guns, 
the clocks, the stacks of blankets. In a glass case he saw 
the serpent knife. 

A heavy-bladed weapon, steel and silver. Around hilt 
and haft, marvelously intricate, was coiled the gold-green 
serpent. Its rattles were clearly marked. Its scales shone. 
Its emerald eyes winked and blinked at old Tim Grady, 
venomously hypnotic. Apparently it stirred and moved. 

“Be Jasus,” said Tim Grady, watching it strangely, “I’d 
like to have that thing! How much ’s it cost ? ’ ’ 

“Well, Sir,” said Gus Bliss. “That’ll cost you pretty 
high.” 

Outside the green car waited. The evening grew darker 
and colder, but Tim Grady did not come out. Padriac 
had drawn forth a note-book; with a pencil-stub he busily 
figured costs and per cents. Tom Jefferson, the giant black 
chauffeur, beat his breast for the cold. He drew up his 
coat collar till only his great white eyes shone in the gather¬ 
ing night. 

A girl, passing hastily down Eighth Avenue, thought 
those white roving eyes were for her. She halted stock 
still, planted on her stumpy, fawn-colored legs. Her dry 
red hair frizzled with anger. She clasped her imitation 
sable coat about her breast. Shop lights now flashing on 
shone in the eyes of Tom Jefferson as he met the girl’s 
stare. 

The girl stuck out her tongue. “Go ahead and get a 
eyeful, you big baboon!” She approached, putting her 
hands on her hips. Provokingly she stared through the 
limousine windows at Padriac Grady. “JJake your nigger 
keep from looking at me!” 


EIGHTEEN DOLLARS FOR DEATH 


9 


Padriac glanced up, rubbed his chin, then resumed his 
calculations. A half dozen street loafers sauntered up. 
“What's the coon doing to you, Dot?" Their weak, white 
faces scowled at Tom Jefferson. “Don’t you try fooling 
with a white girl, black boy!" 

Tom Jefferson looked stonily ahead of him. Apparently 
he had not heard. But beneath his fur coat his giant 
shoulder muscles rippled. Cold, hard, immitigable as black 
granite. 

The slow approach of a policeman drove the loafers and 
Dot away. 

Within the pawnshop old Tim Grady and Gus Bliss yet 
bargained over the price of the serpent knife. Keenly 
they fought. Old Tim was shrewd. Liberal as the wind 
in his gifts, but tight as a Scotchman in a bargain. His 
glances brightened. He would make the bargain hard, 
even for death. 

“This here knife," said Gus Bliss, leaning over his coun¬ 
ter, his soul warmed by converse with such a fine gentleman 
as Mr. Grady. “This here knife was left by me by Mr. 
Pete Lopez, the gentleman who reads fortunes." 

“Twelve dollars!" growled old Tim. “Not anither 
cent, if I bar-rn for it!" 

“Forty-eight, and I lose money. This here knife was 
used by Mr. John Dawn in the movies. He cut another 
gentleman’s throat in ‘Hearts Afire.’ " 

“Far-rteen dollars!" old Tim said, banging down his 
fist. “I’d not do more for my own mother.’’ 

Mr. Bliss threw wide his palms. Tears trembled in his 
soft brown eyes. Lovingly he fondled the serpent knife, 
broad steel blade, light silver handle. 

“Thirty-six dollars," he said gently. “This here knife 
is one beautiful piece of work. It would be a fine thing to 
give to a lady." 

The pawnbroker balanced the weapon on his palm. Old 
Tim’s fingers itched for it. The weighty blade slipped 
from Bliss’s nervous hand. Point deep it drove in the 


10 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


soft pine counter. The serpented haft vibrated to music 
inaudibly fine, as though the snake’s belled tail had begun 
a warning poisoned song. 

Old Tim pulled it out, but it cut the pads of his fingers. 
Again the knife dropped, again stuck point first in the 
wood. Tim Grady cursed. 

‘‘A heavy blade,” said Gus Bliss, “and sharp.” He 
stroked the weapon once more. The artist’s fiery passion 
was evident in his glance. “Thirty-six dollars,” he said 
softly. 

“I’ll split the difference,” old Tim roared. “I ain’t a 
nickle nurser. Eighteen dollars!” He flipped out a large 
wallet and fished through it. 

“Split the difference between what?” asked Mr. Bliss. 

“Between thirty-six and nothing,” said old Tim Grady. 
“Eighteen! Count it. Smell it. Bite it.” He slapped 
down the dirty bills. 

Gus Bliss intoned the dolorous song of the Babylonian 
captivity as he wrapped the serpent knife in an old copy 
of the Morning Mist. Strong twine about it. Its heavy 
blade could not cut through, nor its golden serpent sting. 
Old Tim watched with the pride of ownership, glorying in 
a bargain. 

A blow upon Grady’s shoulders. “Well, wad the divils 
look? It’s auld Tim Grady!” 

Old Tim turned furiously. A fat man had come in the 
shop, an illy wrapped bundle under his arm. His nose 
was stub, set in a face round and red as an orange. He 
reeled, leaning heavily on Tim’s shoulders. His breath was 
beery. Foolishly he winked and laughed. “Pawning yer 
pants, Tim?” 

“Git off me, McGinty, ye drunken mick!” old Tim said 
with dignity, giving a blow to the fat fellow. “Don’t ye 
know a gintleman when ye see one ? ’ ’ 

McGinty’s laughter faded. “Why so uppty-duppty?” 
he inquired. “Do ye think I’ll take an-ny airs from ye, 
Tim Grady? Ain’t we fri’nds?” 


EIGHTEEN DOLLARS FOR DEATH 


11 


“We do not belong to the same class of society,” said old 
Tim Grady, brushing the sleeve McGinty had polluted. 

“Ay,” said McGinty, with half a sneer, watching the 
wrapping of the knife. “Up to yer auld tricks, Tim?” 
He nudged old Grady. 

“What do ye mane?” Tim roared in thick brogue. 

Winking often and drunkenly, McGinty leaned over and 
whispered close to old Tim’s ear. McGinty was tall, yet 
he had to stand on his toes. Gus Bliss listened, but he 
could not hear what words McGinty spoke. 

“ . . . The bloody moon. ...” 

What whisper was it in that darkly lighted pawnshop 
from McGinty’s drunken lips? Old Tim Grady clutched 
to the counter. His knees sagged. Why did old Grady’s 
jowls fall slack? Why wilted the fury from his face? 
What ague of terror made his body shake ? 

“Ye can trust yer fri’nd Dinnis McGinty,” said Mc¬ 
Ginty, giving another poke to old Tim’s ribs. 

Blood came back in old Tim’s face. He turned in a 
fury, waving his fists so viciously that McGinty was 
sobered. Bliss crouched behind his counter, muttering: 
‘ 1 Gentlemen! Gentlemen! Pleasant gentlemen! ’ ’ Mc¬ 
Ginty stumbled backward, his arm over his face. 

“I’ll turn ye over to the police, Din McGinty, if you ope 
your mouth! I ’ll get you! ’ ’ 

“Try and do it,” said McGinty. “Try and do it.” 

Old Tim Grady snatched up the wrapped serpent knife, 
hurrying out to where his son and black Tom awaited him. 
Even through the thick paper wrappings the heavy blade 
felt cold. 

And his heart felt cold. It was the ebb-flow of alcohol. 


12 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


II. THE DOG-FACED SPHINX 

H ERE you see again that dark and silent man, Mr. 

Anthony Anthony, organizer and head of the 
Argus Agency (private detecting neatly done). 
He sits in his hotel room thinking of several things, while 
his ears are filled with the chattering of one Wigley Arsen, 
star reporter of the Morning Mist. 

Arsen talked of prohibition, the income tax, women, and 
the movies, all of which are very important things these 
days. Rose Dawn’s photograph, standing boldly on An¬ 
thony’s table, brought up talk of the movies. Arsen’s 
words (Arsen was a wit) buzzed here and there, bright 
little bees in flowers. 

“Men like the movies because the heroines are silent,” 
said Arsen, pulling at his watch-chain, and waiting for the 
expected laugh. 

It was not clever. Anthony did not laugh. Arsen tried 
again. 

“When God speaks on the movie screen,” said Arsen, 
“He always speaks in old Gothic caps.” That brought a 
smile. Arsen was pleased. “When a movie matron is 
shown sewing little silk diapers,” he said, hysterical with 
his own laughter, “the orchestra makes music to imitate 
the rustle of a stork’s wings.” 

And so on. 

Anthony’s rooms were adorned in bizarre fashion. Old 
weapons—rusty guns, swords, pikes, hung on the walls or 
stood in comers. There was a sea-rotted gray ship’s plank 
over the fireless mahogany mantel, its lettering—“777”— 
dimly illegible. A mounted giant flying fish, stiff wings 
outvanning, goggle-eyes popping, smirked like a winged 
Assyrian devil, a Tiamtu of abominations. 

Queerest of all was the floor rug, an intricate design em¬ 
bodying the essence of nonsense. Arsen thought it inter- 


THE DOG-FACED SPHINX 


13 


esting. “What does this fool design mean, Tony?” Arsen 
asked Anthony Anthony. 

Seven blue pyramids beside a winding yellow river (or 
perhaps a winding snake). A three-humped green camel 
bending elegantly to drink the river, if it was a river, to 
bite the snake, if it was a snake. Set in this scene of 
rural Egyptian placidity, a dog-faced Sphinx slept on its 
paws. Its chin lay on the sand; its brow was wrinkled with 
mysterious canine thoughts; its very ears were portentous. 
Now it seemed to raise its head, and listen. Upon its 
square dog face was hateful, sardonic laughter. 

All this Arsen saw woven in the rug. And the journal¬ 
ist, curiously, was sober. As he peered, and watched that 
grinning face, Arsen fancied the rug held some secret 
meaning, portrayed a mighty truth just beyond his com¬ 
prehension. The three-humped camel meant something. 
The snaky river meant something. Yes, surely that loath¬ 
some mirth meant something on the face of the dog-faced 
Sphinx! 

The mystery tantalized Arsen, and in the midst of a word 
he became silent. His bright glance flickered. Some ma¬ 
gician of the East in ancient ages had bewitched that rug, 
had labored over it in the sweat of his soul, for centuries 
long spinning into it his occult knowledge of the meaning 
of life. Bewitched it was, for the dog-faced Sphinx opened 
its eyes, and yapped. 

Over the left shoulder of the Sphinx six tufted threads 
of deepest red formed a full round moon. 

The riddle of existence! And used for a rug. The feet 
of stupid generations scuffled it, their placid rockers 
plowed it, their blind fat eyes looked full on it, ignorant 
and dull. Something terrible in the weaving of that rug! 
Arsen was superstitious. 

Leaning over curiously, Arsen took from the table the 
photograph of Rose Dawn. Unmistakable her clean, pi¬ 
quant, almost boyish face, her drooping mouth, fair curls, 


14 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


marvelously clear eyes. She was dressed in Spanish cos¬ 
tume, with black cobweb lace mantilla, tall tortoise comb, 
and a rose in her hair. Hers was a face known to millions, 
known better than the face of any other woman was ever 
known before, than even the countenance of the Madonna, 
than even the fabled beauty of that queenly harlot who 
razed great Troy. 

“Pm not what might be called a youngster any more, 
Tony, nor what might be called a fool.” Arsen paused, 
but Anthony did not agree. The reporter was irritated. 
He would allow no man even tacitly to admit him a fool. 
“Well, I’m not! You can take my word for it. But if 
ever I could be a fool for a woman, this would be the wo¬ 
man ! ’ ’ 

Arsen looked long at the photograph. 

“So she is going to marry Tim Grady,” mused Arsen. 
“I think I could—if I were that sort—kill a man to have 
her for just one night. Though that’s a Hell of a thing to 
say.” 

Anthony opened wide his black, startling large eyes. 
He sneered. “Some time,” he said, “some man may.” 
Then he laughed, but not happily. 

Wigley Arsen was looking at the dog-faced Sphinx, the 
riddle of whose meaning would never cease to fret him 
till he solved it or he died. “You know Rose Dawn?” he 
asked. But Anthony shook his head. 

11 Old Tim Grady is a fool to marry her, ’ ’ Anthony said 
morosely. d not do it.” 

“7 would,” said Arsen. 

“And you would die happy,” said Anthony. 

“Of course I would.” 

“So will old Tim Grady.” 

11 Grady will do what ? ’ ’ Arsen asked. 

“He will die.” 

Wigley Arsen glanced at his toes, and from them at the 
dog-faced Sphinx. Mystery in the Sphinx’s smirk, as in 


THE DOG-FACED SPHINX 


15 


Anthony’s words. Or again, there might be nothing. 

Announcing himself by a knock, Ike Duval tiptoed in. 
Plis jowl was set like bitter stone. His small eyes did not 
blink. He gave a half salute: “ ’Evening, Chief.” He 
rolled his derby on his forefinger, flashing suspicious 
glances about him. His eye on Arsen seemed to say: 
“That man bears watching.” On Anthony: “He’s a 
queer un.” On his own face in a mirror: “I’ve seen him 
in the rogues’ gallery.” 

If there was anything secret about Solemn Ike, it was 
an open secret that he was a second-rate detective, some 
dogger of suspected spouses and peeper-in at keyholes. 
His very shoes were in the police fashion. But he was 
sharp and shrewd, and he was tenacious. His surly mind 
could bear hate for long. 

“Everything’s pretty good,” Ike said, in answer to a 
question from Anthony. “Grady’s moved out to Dawn- 
rose now. We get good grub. Christmas Eve’s coming 
soon, when he’ll be getting married. A big blowout. By 
the looks of the wind, it’ll be full moon.” 

“Is Grady still harping on that?” Anthony asked 
alertly. “Does he want me to assign another man?” 

“No need, Chief. Grady’s got a big black hope now, 
name o’ Tom. And I ain’t a-scared of no moon.” 

“Funny,” Anthony told Wigley Arsen when Ike had 
gone out. ‘ ‘ Grady has some wild notion that the full moon 
is bad for him. He’s superstitious as a goat, you know. 
He’s asked the Argus Agency to guard him. So I’ve as¬ 
signed him Ike Duval.” 

Arsen was not giving attention. That curious rug fas¬ 
cinated him. He wanted to ask Anthony its meaning 
again, if Anthony knew. Anthony’s remark hummed in 
his ears: i ‘ Tim Grady will die! ’ ’ 

Tim Grady, the rich man! It did not seem plausible. 
He was a millionaire. Well, well, indeed (thought Ar¬ 
sen) ; but we all die! 


16 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


III. REMEMBER YOUR SINS, TIM GRADY! 

A CRYSTAL globe clear as water, round as a giant 
dew-drop, was throned on a black velvet pedestal. 
Shiwa, God of Faces, blew incense smoke through 
flaring nostrils. Lamps hung and swung like little ruddy 
jewels. Curtains pasted with gilt stars and crescent moons 
shut out all light of the cold December day. By the wall 
on a tripod rested a hemispherical bowl of water, to which 
a nickeled pipe led. Occasionally blue fires flickered on the 
surface of the water; flamed, danced, died down without 
a glow. 

Old Tim Grady strode into this sorcerer’s den of Pete 
Lopez, who passed as clairvoyant. Tim strode; but fear 
was in his step. His heels were cold; his spine felt brittle. 
He pulled and pulled at his gloves. Pete Lopez, sitting 
curled up in a chair like a little shriveled spider, watched 
old Tim cunningly, quite a little amused. 

“Ye are the fellow they call the Sear Nit?” 

‘ ‘ Le Sieur Nuit, ’ ’ murmured Pete, pulling at his ragged 
mustache. 

“All r-right. I don’t need to tell ye my name, since” 
(cunningly) “if ye’re as smar-rt as ye think ye are, you 
know it already. And if no, ’tis no harm. I want you to 
understand in the beginning that I think all this is non- 
sinse. I don’t believe a war-rd of it!” Tim pounded fist 
into palm. “Feed it to the fool women, but you and me 
are too smar-rt, huh?” 

Pete Lopez, small as a monkey, and with face nearly as 
dark, waved a gracious hand. His speech held a slight 
Southern slur which can’t be duplicated. “Of course, of 
course, Mr. Grady. Have you come to see me about your 
marriage to Rose Dawn?” 

Tim Grady sat down sharply, feeling his knees. “So ye 
know my name, do ye?” he roared, somewhat frightened. 

‘ ‘ How did ye do that ? ’ ’ 


REMEMBER YOUR SINS, TIM GRADY! 


17 


Lopez closed his beady eyes. “You were bom in Ire¬ 
land—• ” he began carefully. (“County Car-rk,” old Tim 
nodded, watching Lopez strangely.) “In eighteen-sixty— 
sixty—” (“1863,” gasped Tim, excited. “The ilivinth 

of July, to a dot. How did ye know that?”) “I know all 
things,” said Pete Lopez drolly. 

He spoke slowly, groping for words: “Very intricate 
planetary aspect. . . . Warring stars. . . . Influences of 
Jupiter, Mars, Bacchus. . . . Love. ...” (“Married 
twice by church,” said old Tim Grady. “And many an¬ 
other woman besides.”) “Great wealth. ...” (“I 

reckon I ain’t bankrupt,” said old Tim Grady.) “But 
troubles, troubles. ...” (“Ay, I’ve had ’em,” said old 

Tim Grady.) 

All this with many pressings of his brow, many long fits 
of brooding on the part of Pete Lopez. Occasionally he 
opened a hidden faucet, causing blue fire to lick on the sur¬ 
face of the water-bowl. Now he arose, pacing up and down 
with quick catlike strides. 

“A night of full red moon when you were born, Mr. 
Grady!’ ’ 

“What do ye mane?” Old Tim’s tongue was thick. 
“Don’t speak to me o’ the bloody moon!” he cried. 

Lopez spread out a chart, crinkling and black, on which 
astral orbits were marked by white ellipses and dots. Like 
an angel in flight from star to star Lopez’s lean brown 
finger pointed. Tim Grady breathed slowly. His com¬ 
plexion was pasty. He held a handkerchief to his temples. 

“Your son and daughter will give you trouble,” whis¬ 
pered Lopez, watching old Tim to see how his words were 
taken. “And the stars do not speak well, Mr. Grady, of 
your marriage to Rose Dawn.” 

Old Tim’s lips muttered foolishly. For a long time he 
could not speak. His hooked nose quivered in some passion 
too vast for other utterance. 

“They don’t? Ay, no! I see ’tis an evil sign. 0, 
damn—” He breathed heavily,, smearing his paws over 


18 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


the chart. With an oath he dug his strong fingers into 
the paper. “0, damn to all the star-rs!” 

He leaped up, tearing the black map strip by strip, 
growling at it, mad as a dog. “I don't believe your dirty 
nonsinse! A trick’s in it! It’s a lie!” He stamped and 
kicked the torn paper on the floor. “The curse of Crom¬ 
well on ye! What are ye after-r being after-r ? ’ ’ 

Lopez watched calmly, still amused. “Look!” he said 
sibilantly. 

One of the red ceiling lamps was reflected in the crystal 
globe. It shone upon that convex, gibbous-imaging mirror 
in a round red fire. 

“The full red moon,” Lopez said with a sneer. “Your 
evil sign. Watch out for it!” 

“What do ye know?” howled old Tim Grady, swaying, 
falling to a chair. “What do ye know?” 

Pete Lopez, known also as Greasy Pete, called up a pri¬ 
vate telephone number when old Tim Grady had staggered 
out. He got Gay Deleon, the gambler, on the wire. 

“Old Tim Grady was just in to have me read the stars. 
He’s afraid for some reason of the full moon. . . . Thought 
I’d give him a scare. Told him he is a fool to marry Rose 
Dawn. . . . All right, all right. But he is a fool. . . . 
0, no. I don’t wish him that, Gay. ...” 

Pete put on his great coat and went out, no doubt to 
consult another astrologer. For though he knew himself 
a fake, yet he was a believer, and there are stars. 


IY. BLACK TOM JEFFERSON 

M A HIGGS, mother of lovely Rose Dawn, was a 
whale of a lady. She had creased, blubbery 
arms, breasts, and chins. If these be beauty, 
she made the most of them. Her hair was gold faded to 
hideous brass. 

She had once been prize beauty in the Harvey eating 


BLACK TOM JEFFERSON 


19 


house, Moline, Kansas. Had married the snappiest drum¬ 
mer who ever ate fly-specked pie at Moline while the old 
Santa Fe local waited, and snorted, and took on water. 
Had been paramour of a traveling actor who traveled with 
her to Evansville, Illinoy, and pursued his travels alone. 
Had made her living by cooking, scrubbing, and by put¬ 
ting her daughter in the movies. She thought her life had 
been hard, which was true; and often wept'over it, which 
was not pleasant. 

For the past fifteen years, since Rose Dawn (then Rose 
Lovely) at the age of ten had entered the movies, Ma Higgs 
had lived according to her deserts. Her nails were mani¬ 
cured as often as she pleased. She stuffed herself with 
greasy sweets until her tongue fermented. Her diamonds 
were probably the largest and ugliest ever dug from the 
dirty earth. In short, she enjoyed the varied satisfactions 
of being rich. 

Out of the clay, the poppy. Out of the mire, the lily. 
Out of Ma Higgs, out of a snappy drummer and a traveling 
actor, out of Moline and Evansville, beautiful Rose Dawn. 
Could anything so fair and sweet come to earth that way? 
Did not an angel bring her here, unborn of flesh, wrapped 
in the pin-feather down of his wing? 

Ma Higgs answered a telephone ring. Rose Dawn, beau¬ 
tifully marcelled, gowned, and tinted for the afternoon, 
sat on a divan. Her legs were thrown sideways like a mer¬ 
maid ’s tail, if mermaids’ tails were ever clad in spider-web 
hose. Her head rested at an angle on both her palms. 
Her great blue eyes, staring past the outer window, were 
softened with a hint of tears. It was a pose in which she 
had been often photographed, and which gave full value 
to her fair, exquisite beauty. Each of her poses and ges¬ 
tures was always like that, perfection of grace, of an artful 
artlessness which was true as life. Two interviewers 
(male, stammering, frog-chinned and titwit-voiced) had 
just been dismissed. 

Even as she swore over the telephone, Ma Higgs ad- 



20 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


mired her daughter’s pose. To be sure Ma Higgs loved 
Rose. In her she dreamed of her own lost beauty. More, 
Rose was a meal ticket. 

Ma Higgs shouted: “Get off the wire, you loafer!” 
She slammed up the ear-piece with a bang, continuing to 
mutter. “Gay Deleon ringing you up again, dearie,” she 
said. “You ain’t got any business fooling around him, 
now we got old Grady hooked.” 

A thin frown was on Rose’s clear forehead. She tossed 
her head, but said nothing. She was afraid of her mother. 

“Deleon’s only another good-for-nothing like that John 
Dawn,” said Ma Higgs spitefully. She had always hated 
Rose’s husband, could not forgive him even now that he 
was dead. “And it was only God’s own mercy you ever 
got rid of him.” 

Rose Dawn put her hand to her mouth; it might have 
been an acted gesture. She did not reply. She arose, go¬ 
ing to her room. A quarter of an hour later Mrs. Higgs 
found her in the bathroom, washing her red eyes. But a 
touch of powder, a touch of paint, and that was soon 
mended. 

Old Tim Grady came in. He looked about him with a 
large air of proprietorship, his hands in his pockets. And 
why not? He paid for these expensive hotel rooms. He 
would pay for Rose Dawn. He was rich, and his money 
would buy anything. 

“Arrah, Rosie, me colleen bawn!” he greeted with jocu¬ 
lar brogue. 

Rose gave him her fingers, but did not kiss him. She 
hoped she would never kiss him. Now he smelled of alco¬ 
hol, and his ragged white mustache was dirty with cigars. 

“A week,” said old Tim, pressing her hand, breathing 
thickly, bending close as though he would gobble her up, 
bone and flesh, between his strong yellow teeth. “Only a 
week more, Rosie ! Think of it! ” 

Rose Dawn tried to smile. She had thought of it, 
many and many a night alone. But all her thoughts 


BLACK TOM JEFFERSON 


21 


could not let her deny that old Tim Grady was rich. 

Mrs. Higgs smiled fatly. She folded her porcine arms 
on her breast. Truly that light, however dull it was, which 
shone in her round little blue eyes was light of motherly 
love. She loved Rose, wished all good things for her. The 
greatest good she knew, here or in Heaven, was to marry 
Rose to a very rich man. Her daughter would never know, 
God willing, even with children of her own, how Mrs. Higgs 
had schemed and worked to bring this marriage to pass. 
Thinking of her own tribulations, Ma Higgs sniffled. 

Grady’s flaming, hard eyes passed about the room. 
“You’re well fixed,” he said with satisfaction. “ ’Twill 
serve for a week. I’ve moved out to Dawnrose now. 
Everything’s ready for you, Rosie. The painters are still 
about, but the mess of the carpenters is being cleared up 
by some dirty dagoes. I’ve got a surprise for you, Rosie. 
]Wait. Close your eyes. I brought it with me. ’Tis what 
the old imperors used to give their imperesses.” 

Old Tim essayed a jocose tone, but his normal snarling 
voice broke through. He put fingers to Rose’s arm, which 
quivered at the touch. Mrs. Higgs smiled; she would have 
liked to dance and whoop. She rolled her eyes to the ceil¬ 
ing. 

Once before a bridal home had been built for Rose Dawn; 
none such as Tim Grady’s great new Hudson mansion, 
Dawnrose. “Red Rose,” John Dawn had called that little 
Hollywood home. She had been more easily pleased then. 
Her heart had been younger; not so old and hard as it was 
now at twenty-five. Red Rose was gone to smoke and 
flame. Over John Dawn rolled illimitable oceans. 

The ash; the drowned; the dead . . . forget them! But 
thinking of that old time. . . . Thinking of the dead. . . . 
Old Tim Grady was genially talking. 

Old Tim’s quick glance rolled about him. He started 
towards a small snapshot lying on the music cabinet. Mrs. 
Higgs made a motion to snatch it, but Tim forestalled her. 
Mrs. Higgs was panicky. 


22 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


4 ‘Who’s this?” old Tim growled, snapping the picture 
with his thumb. 

It was a tiny photograph, faded by sun, frayed at the 
edges, of a young man. Through the haze of a cigaret he 
smiled. Half of his torso was visible; he was sitting on a 
horse. Old Tim’s fingers trembled. Surely a dead man 
had never looked with eyes so keen and bright! 

“That’s that John Dawn,” Mrs. Higgs said nervously. 
“That’s him in ‘Hearts Afire’ eight years ago.” 

“I never set eyes on him before,” said old Tim, looking 
darkly at the snapshot. He twitched with jealousy, the 
curse of libertines. 

On a pretext, Rose had gone. Tim flopped down on the 
divan, spreading his knees apart. Mrs. Higgs seated her¬ 
self beside her future son-in-law (who was her senior by a 
dozen years). She coughed; she bustled; finally she nipped 
at his sleeve with her fingers. 

“I believe in being practical,” said she, looking over 
her shoulder to see if Rose w^as within hearing. “That 
poor dove is so romantic.” 

“What poor dove?” old Tim snarled, drawing away 
from her, whom he thoroughly hated. 

“Why, Rose.” 

“ 0 ! ” Tim gave a hard, sly laugh. 

“She flung herself away on that Dawn when she wasn’t 
no more than sixteen or seventeen,” went on Ma Higgs, 
“without a thought to the morrow, or the roof that covered 
her, or her poor Ma who had worked so hard to make her 
what she was, and give her a chance, and let her live a life 
where she wouldn’t have to do scrubbing on her bare 
knees. ...” 

Her talk rambled on and on. She could talk more, say¬ 
ing less, than any other woman in captivity. It would be 
vastly wearisome to chronicle her circumlocutions, for they 
caused a sickness of the flesh, a dizziness of the ears, a va¬ 
cuity of the medulla oblongata. Old Tim scratched his 
red-gray hair, paying no attention. 


BLACK TOM JEFFERSON 


23 


Higgs lengthily arrived at the point. “You’ve got your 
son, and your daughter, and no doubt they think they’re 
millionaires, and go throwing your money around like 
drunken sailors, and spending it here and there. And 
they’ll have children, and get married, and come to you to 
feed them—” 

“My boy Padriac will spend no money he don’t ’arn,” 
old Tim said drily, breaking in when he could. 

“I’ve known him to buy orch-ids for Rose,” Higgs lied, 
slyly nodding and nudging. “If she wasn’t too sensible a 
girl to marry a young fellow dependent on his father for 
his clothes, and his shoes, and his neckties, and—” 

“What’s that?” roared old Tim. His red eyes glittered. 

“Padriac’s been seeing Rose?” 

“Ah, I thought you didn’t know of his going-ons,” said 
Higgs, with low pleasure. “It’s a wise farther knows his 
own son.” 

“I’ll cut him off without a copper! I’ll drive him to 
the street!” 

“Be that as it may,” said Mrs. Higgs, secure in the 
satisfaction of a perfect liar. “But with things as they 
are, and the wedding only a week away, and you and Rose 
about to be married, and she expecting and intending to be 
your wife—” 

“What in the name of auld Ireland are ye driving at?” 
yelled Grady, reverting to his native brogue. ; 

“There ought to be a settlement,” Mrs. Higgs said, firm 
and defiant. “She and hers ain’t going to be deprived by i 
you and yours. ’ ’ 

“Listen to me, woman! Are ye asking me far-r 
money ? ’ ’ 

Mrs. Higgs withdrew a hitch. Old Tim was raging red. 
Higgs had always known him as a most liberal man. She 
did not understand that at a demand for money, or a de¬ 
mand for anything, he shut up tighter than the mountains. 

“We only want what’s right, and just, and square, 
and—” 


24 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“ ‘We want!’ Who do ye think you’re after-r marry¬ 
ing me to?” 

“Rose, I trust,” the woman faltered. 

“Thin Rosie can trust me! I’m not marrying you, and 
don’t ye forgit it! I’m marrying Rose, and nothing will 
stop me. But if ye don’t watch your step, ye’ll be left on 
an iceber-rg in Bar-rneo. If I wa’n’t a gintleman, I’d say 
what no gintleman says, and tell ye to go to the devil.” 

Mrs. Higgs indignantly panted. Her small eyes closed, 
so tight the eyelids screwed in. She gasped; she wheezed; 
she snortled; expressing her emotions in all the ways a 
lady can without swearing. 

To himself old Grady thought : “I’ve star-rted ye right, 
ye old yellow crow! Ye’ll not be after-r going after-r me 
again.” 

To herself Mrs. Higgs thought: “Just you wait till 
we’re married to you! I’ll make you jump over the grand 
pianny when I sneeze, you loud-mouthed old mick! ’ ’ 

She retired in billowing spasms. After whispered words 
beyond the door Rose Dawn returned to pour tea for Tim. 
Tensely Tim watched the soft movements of Rose’s shoul¬ 
ders, his huge hands clasping and unclasping. She will be 
mine, all.mine, fire and light and heat, the flawless woman! 
ran the voiceless burden of his ecstasy. 

Rose was uneasy beneath that fierce gaze. Hot were 
Tim’s glances, yet her spine shivered. Little words: 
“Cream?—How much sugar?” (“To Hell with it,” 
growled old Tim Grady.) Little gestures: the turn of a 
wrist, the quivering of one eyebrow. Little ticking of a 
clock. Little pulsing of hearts. 

“You said you have a surprise for me, Tim.” 

Tim smote his hands together. “Bejabbers, I forgot!” 
He went to the outer door, calling loudly out the hotel cor¬ 
ridor. The door was filled with an enormous shape. Obe¬ 
dient to Tim’s imperious beckoning, Tom Jefferson, 
the giant negro, came stalking in. Hat in hand; his 
shoulders heaving; his white eyes half closed. He seemed 


BLACK TOM JEFFERSON 


25 


to bend to get beneath the crosstree of the door. 

“What do ye think of ’im?” asked Tim Grady, grin¬ 
ning. He gave Tom’s breast a thump. 

Startled, Rose glanced at Tom’s hands to see what gift 
he carried. “No,” said old Tim, understanding her. 
“This is *the surprise—him, Tom Jifferson.” Another 
thump on Tom’s heaving chest. “Ain’t he some black 
fellow?” Grady asked with high pride. 

Tom’s impassive face showed a fleeting expression of 
contempt. His skin was so intense in blackness it seemed 
a ludicrous paint. He stood looking at the carpet. 

“The law says you can’t have slaves,” said Grady. 
“But howsoever that be, Tom Jifferson is mine. Three 
hundred a month I pay him, which is more than nigger iver 
got before. And he’s mine! Turn around, Tom.” 

The negro obeyed, heeling slowly. His black rosewood 
countenance was fierce. A Thor in sable. Stupid, stolid, 
iron power. 

“Bend up your arms, Tom!—Rise on your heels!—Take 
a good breath!—Did ye iver see such lungs ? ’ ’ 

With childish delight Grady pointed out to Rose the 
strength in that body; impersonally, as though Tom had 
been an elephant. 

“And more, he’s highly iducated,” boasted Grady, jam¬ 
ming hands in pockets and rocking on heels. “He’s been 
to the Univarsity. He’s a doctor, and knows his Latin and 
his Greek.” 

Tom Jefferson stood patiently, awaiting what next. 

Rose Dawn nervously pulled at her handkerchief. The 
giant terrified her. The whiteness of his eyes was like 
white heat, and in his stolid air was hint of terrible, 
chained devils! And when those chains should break. . . . 

“I’m going to give him to ye, Rosie,” said Grady. 
“ ’Tis what the imperors did for their imperesses. He’ll 
serve ye honestly.” 

Rose Dawn laughed with hysteria. “What on earth!” 

Now Tom Jefferson’s half closed eyes lifted from the 


26 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


floor, looking full on Rose Dawn. The woman twisted a 
ring on her finger till her flesh was scored. She did not 
meet that glance. Tom’s nostrils quivered. He looked 
away again. One glance. But Rose Dawn would see that 
full glance upon her once again. 

‘ ‘ Send him away, Tim ! 9 7 

“Women are fools,” Tim Grady stated from the depths 
of his wisdom. He was sulky because his gift had not been 
better received. 

Long after old Grady and Tom were gone Rose Dawn sat 
alone, watching a little fire which burned in the hearth 
grate. On the hot bars lay, white and an ash, but still 
glowing, the little snapshot of John Dawn as he had been 
in “Hearts Afire.” Old Tim Grady had thrown it to the 
consuming flame. Dawn’s features were gray and cherry. 
Had that curling crisp paper been touched, all would have 
faded to dust. But his deep black eyes were yet two points 
of light. 

“I was peeking through the door,” said Mrs. Higgs. 
“Grady’s big black nigger give me the creeps.” 

She moved her jaws eternally. Rose did not listen. She 
watched the fire. Its black smoke arising seemed the face 
of Tom Jefferson. 

And in the deeps of coals burned her last token of wild 
John Dawn, consumed to utter forgetting. Thus to old 
memory, thus to love, thus to the dead. He and she had 
once, Rose Dawn thought, played “Hearts Afire” together 
when all the world like that was flame. 

V. ALMS FOR THE POOR 

E VERY rich man gives to causes not always written 
down in the books of the Associated Charities. 
These may be poor relations, old servants, old mas¬ 
ters, or ladies who, once paid for their beauty, are now 
paid for their more precious silence. 

To Mr. Todd, second or third member of Todd, Todd, 


ALMS FOR THE POOR 


27 


Todd, and Todd, old Tim Grady’s personal lawyers, two 
men presented themselves on the afternoon before Christ¬ 
mas. Both came for money. The first of these two men, 
old Thornwood Clay, wore a silk hat and received a stipend 
from Tim Grady. The second, Dinnis McGinty, wore a 
cap and received blackmail. He, of course, was not a 
gentleman. 

Higgleson Todd was a square man with a square bald 
head. He appeared to be constituted of something heavier 
than mercury. When he sat down, it was as though he 
were anchored and cemented to his chair. Higgleson Todd 
was cordial to old Thornwood Clay, for Clay was of the 
very ancient and honorable Clays, and quite as good as a 
Todd. He was less suave to Dinnis McGinty. Why those 
two came to him on the quarter for their doles from 
Grady the lawyer did not know. He suspected some sort 
of blackmail, and did not want to get mixed up in it. For, 
looking at it baldly, blackmail is an unpleasant thing for a 
gentleman to get mixed up in. 

“How are you, Sir?” he bubbled to Clay, discreetly 
sliding a check across his desk. Todd did it with an air 
totally absent. His soul might be in Tahiti for all notice 
he took of the check held lightly in his fingers. “How 
is your son Thornwood?” 

“Very well, Sir. He’s in Florida.” 

Old Clay spoke drily. He wist not of the Todds. He 
put on his gold-rimmed glasses, gazing vacantly about him. 
Over the head of McGinty he stared as though McGinty 
were a louse, a creature not recognizable by the Clays. 
Five years or more, four times the year, Thornwood Clay 
and Dinnis McGinty had met in the offices of the multiple 
Todds, and taken their checks, and gone. They had never 
spoken, but their breath had been like snorts. Nothing so 
devilish proud as your beggar. 

“Miss Dubby! Miss Dubby!” Todd boomed, hammer¬ 
ing his desk. “Show Mr. Clay to the door,” he ordered 
the frail-haired girl who appeared. 


28 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


The lawyer watched old Clay stalk out the door, thin 
and crackling as an old dried twig. “Hell throw that 
away in the market, or in some gambling hell,” the lawyer 
thought. “Bet he’s tossed away a million in his time. 
Well, he can afford it.” 

Todd could not tell, no one could tell, that only Tim 
Grady’s charity kept Clay from the breadlines and a 
couch on a park bench. Clay’s back was stiff as though 
made of gold. 

“Well!” Todd slapped his thighs, turning brusquely 
to McGinty. 

McGinty was a fat, marvelous red-faced fellow much 
bloated by drink. His eyes were red, too; his nose a posi¬ 
tive purple; his teeth green. Since Tim Grady had be¬ 
gun to make money McGinty had done no work. Idleness 
had wrecked his strong frame more terribly than forty 
years of slavery in Siberian mines. 

McGinty laid his paws on the desk. “I want me 
money!” He wiped his nose with his sleeve. He’d take 
no uppishness from anyone. 11 Me money, Mister-r L ’yer. ’ ’ 

Todd waved a check as though it were not quite dry. 
“Mr. Grady tells me, McGinty, that you’ve made threats 
to him. You’ve been after him for more than your regu¬ 
lar allowance. Mr. Grady’ll not stand for it.” 

“He will stand for it,” McGinty lowered. “He can 
affar-rd it. Put that in your face and chew it. Ain’t him 
and me auld fri’nds?” 

“He has consequently instructed me, McGinty,” Todd 
said coldly, “to tell you that hereafter all funds from him 
will cease. You can expect nothing more.” 

McGinty wasn’t listening. “What’s that?” he de¬ 
manded dully, scratching a hairy ear. 

‘ ‘ I say you ’ll get nothing more! ’ ’ Todd slapped his 
ringing thighs. “I don’t want to see you in here again. 
Clear out!” 

McGinty gulped. He laughed hoarsely, his mirth in¬ 
creasing till it swallowed his face. He leered at the big- 


ALMS FOR THE POOR 


29 


headed lawyer. “Niver s-spit in the wind,” was his sage 
advice. “Tim knows better than to tr-ry anything like 
that on his auld fri’nd Dinnis. What’s the matter? Is 
he saving his money for this pitcher woman he’s after-r 
marrying ? ’ ’ 

“You heard me!” The sneer at Rose Dawn brought 
blood to Todd’s big face. “You get out!” 

“ Ye ’re damned right I hear-rd ye ! And ye hear-r me!” 
McGinty smashed fists on the desk. “If you’re fri’nd to 
Timothy Grady, tell him he’s putting r-rope around his 
nick— ’ ’ 

“Careful, care—” 

“Will that rum-soaked hog tr-ry to ditch Dinnis Mc¬ 
Ginty ? Half of his is mine! If he but tr-ries to double- 
cross me—double-cross me —” McGinty closed a great 
hairy fist so tight the fingers seemed riveted—‘‘ I ’ll strangle 
him!” 

Leaning back in his chair Todd listened to McGinty 
foam. He was rather pleased. “ Do you know, McGinty, ” 
he asked, breaking into McGinty’s roars, “your threats 
can send you to jail for a year and a day? I have no 
compunction about sending you to jail, McGinty. One 
more crack from you, and I will! ’ ’ 

McGinty growled his laughter. “Ask Tim Grady be¬ 
fore ye tr-ry that, Mr. L’yer. Send me to jail. But if 
ye do, by this duke,” (a shake of his fist) “Tim Grady 
will hang!” 

He stalked forth, proud as an Irishman. 


VI. THE UNINVITED GUEST 

W INTER night. Eve of Christmas. The moon 
is round and red as a tiger’s eye. 

Lights and violins bubble bright from Dawn- 
rose-on-the-Hudson. Old Grady’s wedding night. The 
mansion is new, the violins, lights, guests are new, and the 


30 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


most expensive money can buy. The Hudson alone is old 
within this newness, and black with a scum of ice. 

The wedding guests are those not too proud to know a 
rich man, and not too rich to be proud of knowing a rich 
man. 

There is Dr. Russel Spencer, Grady’s private physician 
and specialist on alcoholism. A lean man with tortoise¬ 
shell glasses and sandy beard. He has a droll turn of 
mind and putters when he talks. 

There is Captain Peter van Chuch, a short-legged Dutch 
dunderhead, plump, full-faced; a man not yet old, though 
he is eating himself to death. Van Chuch was once of the 
fighting Navy, Annapolis and the rest, but found the going 
too rough. He skippers Grady’s white yacht, the Thorn. 
The brass and trumpery of the Navy are on his face, but 
not the gray glint of the guns. 

There is Higgleson Todd. There is young Buddy 
Schermerhorn, known as Squirmy, who would go any 
place for a drink. There is Mrs. Tiffany Bonnell, whose 
husband’s cousin married a Sir. There is Mrs. Wiggs, 
whose grandfather was a gentleman. 

Other guests. Large noses; lumpy panniers; dewlap 
jowls; gentlemen like barrels; ladies like potatoes. The 
aristocracy of the Republic is gathered, the hope of cul¬ 
ture, many of whose immediate forebears could write no 
more legibly than a crow. A scene of fashion and dis¬ 
dain. The queen of beauty marries the king of money. 
If on this Christmas Eve you took the whirlwind’s wings, 
seeing all gracious gatherings of the elect through all the 
universe from Beacon Street to Lakeshore Drive, from 
Canopus to the throne of Heaven, you could happen on no 
vaster assemblage of wit, fashion, money, pride, and 
astounding facial ugliness. 

A famous event, this. From coast to coast it will be 
bruited. Mrs. Weinvoll, of Milwaukee, Wis.; Mrs. Dusty 
Hoag, of Waco, Tex., will read press accounts of the 
Grady-Dawn wedding with sighs, thinking such things 


THE UNINVITED GUEST 


31 


a great deal finer than Heaven. As they likely are. 

Wigley Arsen, who has already written about it for the 
Morning Mist, talks to Ike Duval. Ike is close by old 
Tim, watching him solemnly, following him from buffet to 
cellaret. Being unable to speak to Grady, Arsen addresses 
himself to Grady’s shadow. A University man, a society 
scrambler, a snobbish sort of man is Wigley Arsen. His 
little brown moustache quivers but for the great; his rest¬ 
less eyes are continually flopping. His vice is to wag his 
tongue in the first person. He loves to couple his name 
with mighty names. At that, he is no fool. 

“I understand from a friend of mine who is very close 
to Mr. Rockefeller that Mr. Grady is worth ten million 
dollars,” says Arsen to Ike, with affable condescension.— 
“Yes, Sir.” Ike # speaks coldly. Arsen is a friend of An¬ 
thony Anthony, for which reason Ike thoroughly dislikes 
him. 

“Young man!” old Tim bursts forth, having overheard, 
as Arsen intended. “Young man, ye can set it down in 
your paper-r I’ve got more than that! ’ ’ 

(“My intimate friend, Mr. Timothy Grady, told me con¬ 
fidentially he is worth a cool twenty million,” Arsen will 
repeat it in the city room of the Morning Mist, tilting back 
in his chair to listen to the whistles.) 

Dr. Bellbender, of St. Cecil’s, will officiate. A nice¬ 
voiced old gentleman, correct as a silk hat, generous to 
beggars, essential at reputable weddings. He is orthodox, 
but liberal; no theologian. Always condescendingly pleas¬ 
ant to Methodists; the yellows quote him as having said 
Jews are human. Solemn Ike, who esteems himself a 
physiognomist, does not trust Bellbender. He thinks 
Bellbender has the face of a baby-murderer. 

“I come from a family of bachelar-rs,” old Tim says, 
quite without humor. ‘ ‘ But I ain’t given that way. What 
do ye think of my third, Spincer? Speak up! I don’t 
mind what ye say.” 

“Remarkably beautiful,” Spencer murmurs thought- 


82 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


fully. “She must be very healthy.” He nods his eyes, 
thinking medical thoughts. 

“I’ve outlived two already.” Grady speaks with cer¬ 
tain grimness. “I’ll outlive her.” 

Dr. Spencer surveys Grady curiously. 

Rose Dawn will be married in black. Close at her side 
her fat old mother watches henwise, ready to cluck at the 
hawks. Mrs. Higgs knows the high worth of her daugh¬ 
ter’s virtue. Rose cannot afford to play with flame, as do 
the daughters of the rich. Only when Bellbender has pro¬ 
nounced his theoretically unshatterable words will Mrs. 
Higgs cease her maternal watch. 

At the outer door, the porte-cochere entrance, Saltpeter, 
the button-faced butler, answers a ring. A bloated indi¬ 
vidual, purple of overcoat and nose, stumbles and tries to 
force entrance. “Auld Tim Grady live here? Tell ’im 
Mister-r McGinty wants to see him—see him at once. I’ll 
brook no no-say! ’ ’ 

McGinty’s breath was alcoholic. Saltpeter stood like 
stone. Uncertainly fumbling in his pockets, McGinty pro¬ 
duced a card. “Me and me fri’nd want to come in. Me 
fri’nd’s card. I’m Mister-r McGinty.” 

“I heard you.” With disdainful fingertips Saltpeter 
took the pasteboard. He read, holding the card beneath 
Iris nose pencil jottings on a white, square card— 

“Rose Dawn, you can’t go on with it. John Dawn.” 

The butler tore the card, crumpling its shreds in his 
fist. “You’re crazy,” he said smugly. “Who gave you 
this?” 

“A man outside. Ye call me cr-razy?” 

“I said crazy.” 

“You’re crazy yersilf!” 

Saltpeter bumped McGinty with his knee, forcing him 
across the carriage drive. Shadows were in the lawns 
without. Saltpeter closed the door, shutting out all ghosts 
and demons. 


DOLLAR FOR DOLLAR 


33 


VII. DOLLAR FOR DOLLAR 

G AY DELEON, the gambler, when flush had cham¬ 
bers on Park Avenue. Luck running ill, he crept 
into some disastrous hole like a spider, there to 
hide and abide. He could spend more money in ill taste, 
and live on less money in good taste, than any other boun¬ 
der in New York. 

A young man, this Deleon, handsome, tricky, with a 
glance fatal to women. Famed as a man about town, if 
that’s fame. He could spice you tales of any of the sacred 
women of Broadway as easily as he could point to cobbles 
on the street.—“In love with Majorie Deveau, Squirmy? 
In ’15 Marjorie and I— No, I’ve got that mixed. That 
was Rose Dawn. She gave me—” His thin, complacent 
drawl would foul an alabaster saint. 

Old Thornwood Clay gambled that Christmas Eve. His 
face white as chalk, with silly, shaking hands, he played 
the money Todd had given him that afternoon. It dwin¬ 
dled. It was last; and it was lost. 

Thin, austere, scion of a line of sportin’ gentlemen, he 
played the game according to the code in a world which 
has lost its codes. Something pretty decent about him, 
too, though his gentility is now but a foolish form. 

Llis black hour. He stroked his hands repeatedly. The 
face of Deleon was flushed and jubilant. There’d been 
high play tonight. Tonight. The night had come, on 
Park Avenue and the sky. Old Thornwood Clay had a 
vision, a dream of death— 

He saw the old, proud house of the Clays toppling. It 
was a house of cards. He, last of the very ancient and 
honorable Clays, sank into quicksands without foundation. 
Still and dead as a scummy swamp all creation about him. 
Serpent eyes rimmed him round, a green light which did 
not flicker. 

By God, the last dollar! 


34 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Before we forget it, Mr. Clay, I hold a couple of thou¬ 
sand of your old 10 Us I’d like to have you settle. 
Twenty-two hundred, to be exact.” 

“To be exact!” Old Clay mutters stupidly. He emp¬ 
ties his pockets. Pens, smoking things, letters, a watch, 
wallet, but no money. 

Deleon picks up one of the letters, making no bones of 
reading it. “Huh! So they bid you to the Grady wed¬ 
ding.” Often, being drunk or sober, Gay Deleon has 
boasted that Rose Dawn loved him. Yet God help her 
clear blue eyes if that be true! For in ways unspeakable 
Gay Deleon is lower than a dog. 

A nasty fury arises in the gambler, compounded of many 
thoughts. He understands from old Clay’s fumblings that 
Clay can’t pay. With a low oath, whose occasion is un¬ 
known to Clay, Deleon raps his knuckles. “I’d like my 
money, Mr. Clay, and I’d like it now!” 

Old Clay stutters, palely flushing. “I’m afraid I 
haven’t got so much on me.” He searches diligently again, 
though he knows it is vain. 

“Is this how much a gentleman’s word is worth?” 
Wisely sneering, Gay Deleon crumples the worthless 
I 0 Us. “They’ll do to start a fire.” 

“Do you question me, Sir? Be assured, Mr. Deleon, I 
pay my debts! Always! I say, always! It is insulting, 
Sir, to question me. It is not gentlemanly.” 

“Either you pay me, or you don’t. If you don’t, you 
know what you are. You’re a damned beggar, that’s what 
you are!’ ’ 

Clawing at his coat, fumbling with his eyeglass cord, 
shaking all over, Thornwood Clay gasps. “Sir? What 
did you say to me?” 

“0, why don’t you wring old Grady for the money?” 
Deleon is not willing to meet Clay’s cold, furious glances. 
“You’ve got some sort of hold on him. Everybody knows 
you’ve been blackmailing him for years.” 


DOLLAR FOR DOLLAR 


35 


“Sir! Sir! I’ll pay you dollar for dollar! Dollar for 
dollar! ’ ’ 

Old Clay is righteously indignant as though from his 
old claws even now he planked down dollar for dollar. A 
very ancient and honorable Clay has spoken. Who dares 
doubt him? 

“Dollar for dollar!” he repeated grayly. “Dollar for 
dollar!” 

“Get it from Grady? I wish you luck. If I had your 
hold on him, Clay, I’d wring him dry.” 

“Dollar for dollar,” mumbled Clay. His lips mouthed 
emptiness. 

“All right. All right. What I want is my twenty-two 
hundred. For the rest, you can dollar for dollar the world 
to death.” 

“You will receive it tomorrow. This debt shall not 
stand! ’ ’ 

On Deleon’s plump face a wise, a subtle smile. His lit¬ 
tle pointed black moustaches bristled like cat’s whiskers as 
craftily above his cards he surveyed old Clay. The old 
man’s anger was worth money to him. 

“And never will you see my face in here again! 
Never!” Clay buttoned and unbuttoned his coat. “Dol¬ 
lar for dollar!” he sang his chant. 

Old Thornwood Clay had played the game, and played it 
out. The honor of the Clays demanded that this debt 
at cards should be paid, though the universe be riven, 
though murder come of it. There was no alternative. 

Clay sat mute for a moment, staring ahead of him with 
dead eyes. He surveyed his recourses; none was left. His 
son was likewise a wastrel at cards; no good could come 
from him. Friends there had been to the house of Clay, 
but they lay beneath the unkempt grass. 

A fine pass for the scion of the very ancient and honor¬ 
able Clays to be come upon! For a long time, and oftenest 
in the night, Gay Deleon would remember the face of 


36 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Thornwood Clay as then he saw it, the cheeks drained of 
all vitality, the lips twitching as though with taste of tears. 
Deleon would remember on his black night, in his dread¬ 
ful hour! 

Now it would be well for you, old Thornwood Clay, 
could you lay your head on a woman’s breast, sobbing 
those tears away. Too late, too late. The world is a hard 
place and lone for old men, who are hard and lone. They 
have no tears. 

“Going to Rose Dawn’s wedding?” Deleon asked more 
cheerfully. “I’ve half a mind to wipe scores clean if 
you’d go out there and break it up. Don’t scowl at me. 
You can’t scare me. Grady’s not worth killing; nor she. 
I was just joking.” Deleon named Rose Dawn with a foul 
oath. “That’s what she is! I know her.” 

Thornwood Clay stumbled out, muttering the incoheren¬ 
cies of insanity. ‘ * Dollar for dollar! ’ ’ And now: ‘ ‘ An 

eye for an eye!” Gay Deleon, who had watched many 
losers go out those dismal portals, knew well old Thornwood 
Clay was done. 

For the winner, the fatness of the earth. For the loser, 
the asp’s tooth. It is a gamble. 

Gay Deleon did not look up. On the white face of 
Thornwood Clay was the dreadful mask of a man who 
whips his soul to murder! 


VIII. THE FACE AT THE WINDOW 

A ND now Mrs. Higgs stands up to give the bride 
away. A bride in black. Her mourning night. 
Here is old Tim Grady, sobered suddenly, wrap¬ 
ping an amazed dignity about him. The Irish (God bless 
them!) are always actors. Old Tim is of the tall men, of 
the race of kings. The high nose, the scornful lip, the 
martial eye—pure Nordic! Tim’s sires have all been em¬ 
perors, though their empiry have been but a pig-sty. 


THE FACE AT THE WINDOW 


37 


Here Rose Dawn. Her golden aureole of hair is uncov¬ 
ered; old Tim’s money will coronet her. Her countenance 
is virginal as snow, in contrast to the blackness of her 
gown, her breast lustrous as ice. Beware, for such sem¬ 
blance of cold lies often in white hot heat. 

Some people, being smart and making pretense of travel¬ 
ing with the go, whisper naughty things about Rose Dawn. 
You may hear them all if you lie down and put your ear 
to the gutter. Who is free of such? They say—They 
whisper—But They speak much, and They are fools. Sure 
her face is fair enough, her eyes incredibly blue. Many 
the brave man who has loved her. 

And now she is to be married to old Timothy Grady, 
who is nothing holy. It is a wonderful thing to be a bride 
to a man with ten—twenty; who can set the price ?—mil¬ 
lions of dollars. And old Tim Grady will not live for 
long. 

Near to old Tim she stumbled. People looked at each 
other. 

“If there be any man,” rolled Dr. Bellbender, in his 
most sonorous tones . . . “let him now speak, or forever 
hold his peace. ...” 

Easily he spoke the name of eternity, though forever is 
a mighty word. He paused, for he was dramatic. Once 
before the forever was spoken to you, Rose Dawn. 

As they knelt a pendant globe made old Tim’s mottled 
face look ruddy, added respectable sparkle to his red-gray 
hair. Rose bowed her head; the curls upon her neck 
brought queer spasms to Bellbender as he looked down. 
The lights gave to her death-black gown a living glow. 

“ . . . Let him now speak. ...” 

Beyond Bellbender an alcove of windows. Beyond the 
windows the darkness. Beyond the darkness the sanguine 
moon. Round about, and round about, whirled the waste 
winds of the void. 

Upon the downcast, exquisite face of Rose Dawn shud¬ 
dered some dreadful thought. A thought, call it; or 


38 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


memory; or vision. She seemed to sway, and Bellbender 
put down his hand. Just for a second, that was all. 

Mrs. Bonnell sighed, it was so appropriate; and Mrs. 
Wiggs felt she could sob, if her grandfather had not been 
a gentleman. Mrs. Higgs looked up and out of the win¬ 
dows. Through the soft silence rang her hard whisper: 
“My God!” 

Bride and groom looked up, following Mrs. Iligg’s 
frozen stare. Nothing to be seen beyond the alcove win¬ 
dows but the cold out-of-doors. Old Tim stared long, bend¬ 
ing back his spine. In those unshaded windows he caught 
the glimmer of the sanguine moon. He trembled as though 
he would catch hold of Bellbender’s knees. 

“ ... Or forever hold his peace. . . . ” 

“Go on! Go on!” Tim whispered thickly. 

Dr. Spencer bobbed up, anxious, professional, suave; and 
bobbed down again. Mrs. Higgs regained her equilibrium; 
she set her jowls. But the pupils of her eyes were still 
dilated, looking larger than her small, cold blue eyes. Tim 
Grady looked no more at the window. His hand over that 
of Rose Dawn was heavy like ice. 

“What was the matter, Ma?” Rose asked her mother 
when she had opportunity. 

“It was nothing. I thought I saw something, dearie. 
But it was nothing.’’ 

Nothing ? Is a ghost nothing, old Higgs, though it come 
back through the shadows, far as to life from the everlast¬ 
ing, far as from Heaven to here? Less than dust on the 
wind, less than a dead flame. 


IX. MIDNIGHT WATCHER 

R ACING wind, and the cold shine of Christmas mid¬ 
dle night. Brooms of storm have swept the skies 
clean, with pale white streaks from east to west. 
At such a sky on such a night a weatherwise sailor might 


MIDNIGHT WATCHER 


39 


look aloft, and say: “There will be hurricane by morn¬ 
ing !” 

Dawnrose is a thousand-eyed pumpkin goblin, each win¬ 
dow reflecting the carmine of the moon. At the door be¬ 
neath the porte-cochere stands the butler, Saltpeter, steal¬ 
ing a whiff of a cigaret. Within, close at all times to old 
Tim’s side, are Ike Duval and black Tom Jefferson, to pro¬ 
tect him from the horrors of the moon. In there may creep 
no crook or spook, wandering houseless in Westchester 
County. 

Up and down the drive, deep in the shadows of bushes, 
out of sight of Saltpeter, walks a solitary man. He waits 
a message that does not come. Rose Dawn is at the dance. 

Coats and reefers so wrap him that if he be young or 
old, fat or lean, or whatever manner of man at all he be, 
is not apparent. His eyes seem preternaturally bright be¬ 
neath his hat’s low brim. He has the appearance of 
height; but that may be due to the night, which casts long 
shadows. 

His step, if you listen, is lowly audible. Slow as a clock; 
something Hamletian in it, something of the tragedian, 
something staged. A moody man, a conceited man. A 
man conscious of himself. He is his own audience in his 
own silent drama. The weighted hemlocks bend, the wind 
pauses, for they expect to hear him speak. 

From his air he may have been so pacing all night. 
Again, his vigil may have just begun. The moon rides 
low. 

Along the river road and up the drive between Dawn- 
rose’s gates, with blur of lights and creaking brakes, comes 
a taxicab, blowing to a halt beneath the porte-cochere. 
Saltpeter has closed the door. Old Thornwood Clay, chat¬ 
tering and shaking, climbs forth from the cab. 

“B-r-r! B-r-r! Sure this is the right place, driver? 
Don’t bother about waiting. Mr. Grady will send me 
home. Have Smith put this on my bill.” 

The chauffeur spits sullenly, wiping his mouth -with the 


40 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


back of his hand. No tip on Christmas Eve. Because he 
is an American and a Christian he mutters gloomily. Hav¬ 
ing unloaded his Americanism and Christianity, he turns 
his car with a shriek and races the wind southward. 

Clay is left alone in freezing shadows. The solitary 
watcher has come up, standing at Clay’s elbow. “Is this 
Mr. Grady’s home?” Clay asks, for the man bears an air 
of authority. “Yes,” the stranger replies, drawing out 
the word long and slowly. “But the wedding is over, 
Mr. Clay.” 

Clay raises his dogged eyes, striving to peer through 
glasses. “I beg your pardon. I didn’t recognize you at 
first. My eyes— You are—?” 

“Yes,” says the unknown. 

Clay fumbles for words. It is not remarkable that a 
man he does not know calls him by name, for he is Thorn- 
wood Clay, of the very ancient Clays, and likely the whole 
world knows of him. His heart is warmed. 

“ So he’s married ? Is she pretty ? I suppose so. Grady 
always had an eye for women.” 

He feels his way up steps to the door. The stranger is 
close at his back as a goblin, and about as full of speech. 
Something disastrous in his presence. Saltpeter, cigaret 
cupped in palm, nods sleepily just inside the entrance. 
Music from the ballroom above drifts and drags. 

Glancing back, Clay sees a light haze of snow on the 
lawns. It looks colder than snow, cold as wet cotton. “I’d 
like to see Mr. Grady,” he explains. 

“What did you say?” 

“I’d like to see Mr. Grady.” 

The stranger draws his ulster collar up to his forehead, 
seemingly immersed in reflection. His fists are clenched. 
“I’d like to see him in Hell!” he whispers with terrible 
voice. 

He goes back slowly to the dark. Old Clay stands still; 
the man is vanished. Clay thinks he has talked with the 
dead. 


BLACK BLOOD 


41 


X. BLACK BLOOD 

OOK at ’er,” stuttered old Tim Grady. Very 
thick his tongue. “Ain’t she the prettiest 

1 J thing you ever saw in skir-rts, gintlemen? Or 
without ’em! ” A cackle; a nudge in the astounded ab¬ 
domen of the Reverend Dr. Bellbender. “That damned 
van Chuch ! If he looks at her again that way I ’ll wr-ring 
his neck! She’s mine! She belongs to Timothy Grady 
now, and no man will come between!—Stand closer up to 
me, Ike Duval, and ye, Tom Jifferson. I feel a cold wind 
on my back. Pour me something, Tom!—She’s mine! I 
will—I will—” 

Old Tim grew wantonly obscene. Dr. Bellbender, be¬ 
ing a bachelor, listened in anguished placidity; Dr. Spencer 
with the glint of a smile behind his sandy beard. 

They stood at the edge of the ballroom floor. Grady had 
gathered a few male wallflowers about him; he talked to 
them as was his pleasure. Deep and thunderously beat 
the drum of syncopated song. Sweat rivuleted in the eyes 
of the negro musicians. 

To the barbaric tomtom tremble of the jungle Rose Dawn 
danced her bridal dance in the arms of Peter van Chuch. 
Dr. Bellbender reflected, curiously trying to find the im¬ 
plication of it, that the known rites of Hymen had gone 
askew these latter days. While the bridegroom stood and 
watched, the young men scrambled to dance with the 
bride—van Chuch, Wigley Arsen, Buddy Schermerhorn, 
Spencer’s son Laurence, even bald Higgleson Todd. Hig- 
gleson Todd most of all. He pressed her close. His moist 
eyes were rapt and ravished with music. 

“She’s mine!” cried old Grady; yet it seemed he lied. 
“Not love nor learning nor looks got her for me, gintle- 
men. I’m no fool. ’Tis money talks, as I’ve told my boy 
Paddy often. Paddy wanted to be a l’yer. ‘L ’yers enough 
in the world,’ I told him, ‘with Todd, and Todd, and Todd, 



42 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


and Todd, and God knows all. Git to war-rk like your 
old man did, and make money/ I says to him. ‘ ’Tis money 
talks.’ Those were my very war-rds. ‘ ’Tis money 
talks.’ ” 

“A very acute observation,” suggested Spencer, in his 
queer puttering way. 

“This is an economic age, Mr. Grady,” Bellbender be¬ 
gan genially. “But I think we should give credit to other 
things, such as breeding and family—” 

“Ain’t I well bred? Ain’t the Grady’s as fine people 
as iver war-r shoes?” 

“True. True. Of course I didn’t mean—” 

“I’ve got blood behind me, don’t ye forgit it! We have 
our coat of ar-rms. We could wear a crown, was we so 
minded. But I ain’t proud or consated over it. It’s noth- 
mg. 

“ ‘The rank is but the guinea’s stamp,’ ” Bellbender 
quoted soothingly. 

Fortunate that old Tim did not know the words. Scotch¬ 
men may not be quoted to an Irishman without disaster. 

“And, speaking of learning, what’s it worth?” Grady 
continued, besotted with loquacity. “You will be sur¬ 
prised, gintlemen, to hear from my own lips that I ain’t 
what you might call highly iducated, in the book sense of 
the war-rd. I come from a family of highly iducated 
gintlemen; not one of ’em but knew his letters, and some of 
’em beyond. My old man wanted me to go to Dublin 
Univarsity and study to be a bishop. He was a student 
his own self. If my old man was living, he could quote 
you Latin like a book. Much good it did him, with his 
hie, haec, hoc,” old Grady added grimly, “when he stood 
in the murderers’ pen!” 

Tim teetered on his heels, hands clasped behind, neck 
stretched, red face thrust forward, loudly talking. Spen¬ 
cer glanced shyly at Bellbender and, meeting the minister’s 
uncomfortable gaze, turned his head away. 

Old Grady paced away, his guests and bodyguards fol- 


BLACK BLOOD 


43 


lowing him in a flock. He strode into the library, pouring 
out drinks. 

“Now, Doc Spincer thinks he’s pretty damned smar-rt 
because he’s a doc. Don’t shake your head and grin at me, 
Spincer! I can read what you’re thinking like a book. 
It’s a gift which comes from handling men, what you call 
phisychology.” 

Tim dilated on his knowledge of practical “phisychol¬ 
ogy, ’ ’ full of wise saws and modern instances. 

“You think you’re smar-rt. But with all your learning 
I hire you, and I fire you. I could affar-rd to hire the 
smartest man iver lived to black my boots.” The air was 
growing thicker; Tim’s head swayed. “That’s what 
money’ll do. It’ll buy iducation, like it’ll buy Ike Du¬ 
val’s strength or Bellbender’s high society name.” 

Tim smacked his lips, highly satisfied. And sat down, 
and stood up again. Some devil of drink goaded him on 
to trouble. 

“Stand up here, Tom Jefferson! Stand closer yet. I’m 
feeling of a draft; and a cold wdnd’s coming in some place. 
Here’s something to chew on, gintlemen. This black fel¬ 
low is my man, body and soul, if he’s got a soul. And 
why? Because my money hires him.” Grady smacked his 
lips again. “I hire him. Yit so far as iducation goes, 
he’s got more’n me, maybe.” 

Solemnly Tom stood beside his master. Spencer had a 
glimpse of uneasy glances cast right and left. Tom’s 
hands were clasped in front of him. And now they opened, 
and he smoothed his waistcoat buttons with sooty fingers. 
A study in moving marble. Above him a square dome of 
light shone full on his shaven, polished head, gleamed in 
the whites of his eyes. 

Jungle minstrelsy beat from the ballroom. Tom’s skin 
seemed to crinkle and crisp; his nostrils widened. He 
stared at nothing. Grady’s guests looked him over with 
insecure boldness, as they might through glass look over 
some huge sleek snake. 


44 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Feeling a silence, Spencer spoke. “ Surely the blackest 
fellow I ever saw,” he pondered, as though Tom were 
deaf. “Pure Zulu, I’d say. Our niggers are mostly 
African West Coast stock, flat-nosed, peaceable, good-na¬ 
tured cowards. The slavers got them because they were 
easy to catch, and they’d bear the lash. But the Zulus, 
by God, are the same race that ruled Ethiopia ! Straight 
nose—thin lips—unusual dolichocephalic skull,” he diag¬ 
nosed. “Where do you come from, Tom?” 

Bellbender looked Tom over with more humanity and 
less science. “So your name is Thomas Jefferson? Do you 
know, my boy, that one of the Presidents of these great 
United States was named Thomas Jefferson? You should 
study and work hard and behave yourself, so some day you 
will be more worthy of the name. It’s a good one. Here’s 
a dollar, Thomas.” 

Tim Grady surveyed his servant maliciously, his head 
at a slant, his lower lip curled. “Ay! He’s studied hard. 
There’s a black fellow claims he’s the gr-reat gr-reat gr-reat 
grandson of the sicond Prisident of these United States, 
Tom Jifferson of Virginia. Like enough it’s so.” 

Tom scuffed the rug. Grady took whiskey neat. 

“And I,” Tim continued, patting his lips with a hand¬ 
kerchief, “Timothy Grady, gr-reat gr-reat gr-reat grand¬ 
son of Terence Rory Grady, who was lord mayor o’ Bally 
by Donegal Water, hire ’im. He’s a smar-rt coon! Tell 
’em how iducated ye are, Tom.” 

Grady was in a fine, fierce delight. He caught up a 
chiffon scarf from a chair, twisting and winding it till it 
was a rope. With the same proud glance of ownership 
he would have directed on his new bride, Tim looked his 
servant up and down. Idly he snapped the wound silk 
chiffon, like a lash. 

Tom spoke without Southern slur: “Four years at 
Howard University, in Washington, getting my B.A. de¬ 
gree. Four years at Columbia Medical, with an M.D. 
That’s all, Sir. It’s not so much.” 


BLACK BLOOD 


45 


Spencer tugged at his sandy beard. Tom a doctor of 
medicine! Spencer felt curiously shamed. “What— 
what—” he puttered. “A physician! Why haven’t you 
entered professional practice—kuf! kuf!—Dr. Jeffer¬ 
son ? 1 ’ 

“I give him three hundred a month/’ Grady said. 
“That’s good reason why. It’s four times as much as he 
could ’arn feeding pills to constipated niggers. Eight 
years it took him to git that iducation, and I buy it for 
a far-rthing. I’ve bought him, like I could buy ye, Spin- 
cer, or ye, Bellbender, was I minded to make the price big 
enough for ye!” 

Dr. Spencer sucked his cigar. Took it from his lips. 
Thoughtfully surveyed the point, which was burning 
enough. Bellbender wiped and wiped his glasses, as though 
they were too dim for vision. 

Old Tim flicked the silken scarf. Tom’s lips were thin 
as a scar; his eyes deep as charred wood, but light in them 
like the light of smoldering fire. In spite of his prattling, 
Tim had respect for the giant’s sullen strength, if not for 
his vaunted learning. He did not intend to strike Tom. 
But the scarf in his hand leaped out too far. It curled 
about Tom’s waist, harmlessly, but shamefully. 

“Don’t you dare to hit me, you old fool!” 

Tom growled deep menaces. His sullen face twisted with 
mad pride, with fury, with the blood lust of the great 
black kings! Again he growled, deep as a tiger. Civiliza¬ 
tion, education, all the white man’s sleekly copied ways, 
fell from him in dust. Snarling, Tom crouched on his 
heels, wrenching the scarf from Tim’s frightened hands. 
With strangling, silent grip he tore the silken scarf in two, 
shaking it like a snake. 

That ripping seemed to bring interlude in the orchestral 
music. Tom’s forehead was greasy; his broad shoulders 
heaved. Ike Duval tried to grasp the giant’s wrists; but 
though his hold was hard and in the best police fashion, 
Tom shook him contemptuously off. He stepped back. 


46 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Tim Grady regained his voice. Of ghosts, of devils, he 
might be afraid; but never, be it said, of a man. 

“Ye damned—damned black baboon! I’ll kill ye for 
this—I ’ll smash ye!—I ’ll fire ye! ” 

He kicked furiously. His big dancing pump flew off, 
striking Tom on the chin. It was absurd. Tom’s anger 
departed; he laughed with all his teeth, heaving great guf¬ 
faws. Tim sprawled back against a chair, puffing and 
blowing and threatening, yelling about the ingratitude of 
servants. 

“I’ll fire ye without a letter of ricommendation, Tom 
Jifferson! I’ll hound ye from the country, if the word of 
Tim Grady’s anything!” 

Tim sat down heavily. He waved away Bellbender’s 
soothing words. 

“Gi’ me my shoe!” Tom picked it up. “Put it on my 
foot!” Tom knelt. “No—I’ll keep ye and make ye pay 
for this, Tom Jifferson. Ye’ll call me an old fool! Ye 
iducated ape! I ’ll put ye where ye belong. Hark ye! 
I ’ll remember this, and ye ’ll pay! ’ ’ 

In the ballroom dancing music swelled, as gin inspired 
the jazz saxophone. Growling yet, Tim walked toward it, 
Tom Jefferson following him close and silently. Two tall 
men, red and black, sunset and night, they stood at the 
ballroom door, watching Rose Dawn. 

“The black fellow will remember!” said Dr. Spencer to 
Dr. Bellbender. 


XI. FALLEN FLOWER 

W HATEVER the terror which had overcome Mrs. 

Higgs on looking out the window, whatever man 
or ghost had wrenched from her that frightened 
cry, it was now forgotten. Rose was married to old Tim 
Grady. No mischance could alter that. 

Higgs sat at the ballroom’s edge, looking stuffed. Her 
diamonds were proud as eggs. 


FALLEN FLOWER 


47 


Maveen, old Tim’s daughter by his second wife, was 
dancing with young Schermerhorn. Maveen was in gold 
and green, which set off a little too brilliantly the cherry 
lights of her hair. Soft blue, even maroon, would have 
made her face look less flushed. For all that, in her own 
way a pretty girl. 

Young Squirmy, being stultified with that which bubbles 
in silver flasks, stepped on Maveen’s ankles, and sprawled, 
kicking her shins. Squirmy was the better part of seven 
feet, and thin as a sapling. His ambition in life was to 
grow a mustache. 

This night was not pleasant for Maveen. She was silky 
and sullen of eye. Her father’s new love was her new 
hate. So filial was she that all his loves became her hates. 
Moreover, Laurence Spencer, the doctor’s son, was whis¬ 
pering in a palm-bower with some young half-bodiced fe¬ 
male. Maveen was raging jealous, since she nourished a 
most partial passion for Laurence’s thinning blond hair. 

Squirmy stepped once too often on her feet, reeling with 
foolish laughter. No manners these days; no one apolo¬ 
gizes for anything. Maveen disentangled herself, mutter¬ 
ing a word not nice. She sat down by Mrs. Higgs, fiercely 
wishing for a cigaret. 

“0, I say,” muttered Schermerhorn, following her over. 
“I say.” 

He didn’t say what he did say. Maveen looked at her 
injured feet. With an unsteady shrug the beanpole young 
man dandled himself away. 

Fanning herself, Mrs. Higgs looked at Maveen from the 
edges of her fat eyes. She barely knew old Tim’s daugh¬ 
ter, but was suspicious of her. This night had given her 
authority as step-grandmother to Maveen. With her in¬ 
stinctive combativeness, she resolved to exert that author¬ 
ity at once. 

‘ ‘ Where’s your sweet brother, dearie ? ’ ’ she asked, strok¬ 
ing Maveen’s gown. “I ain’t saw him. Or is he that 
young fellow you was dancing with?” 


48 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Padriac is only my half-brother, ’ ’ Maveen replied with 
great distinctness. “I am sure I do not know where he is.” 

“Him and your farther had a fight?” demanded Higgs. 
Maveen answered nothing. “Don’t like your farther 
a-marrying Rose, don’t he?” 

Maveen tossed her bobbed red hair, giving Higgs lofty 
glances. “0, yes, Padriac’s crazy about it. We’re all 
crazy about it.” 

“Just as well you are,” Mrs. Higgs said briefly. “You 
couldn’t be nothing else.” 

Silence developed, but in Mrs. Higgs’s vicinity no si¬ 
lences grew old. Maveen seethed; she stayed for trouble. 
Wigley Arsen ambled up, asking her to dance in his voice 
like nice ice-cream. Maveen waved him away. 

“What a pretty dress, dearie!” The Higgs creature 
grasped a fold of Maveen’s gown in her pudgy hand. 
“This green is the only thing you can wear and look any¬ 
wheres decent, ain’t it? Red hair is so hard a cross to 
bear. Arburn, I suppose you call it. Some call it arburn, 
and some call it henner, but 1 call it red.” 

Maveen wrapped herself in her brief skirts. Ladylikely 
she tapped her foot. 

“My own Rose can wear anything and look like the 
Queen of Sherbet,” said Higgs, folding her hands in her 
tranquil lap. “I’ve saw her take a tasty little piece of 
rag that wasn t hardly more’n a dish-cloth, and wear it 
at a dance with all the fellows crazy about her. She’s the 
sort don’t need clothes!” 

Maveen squirmed and yawned. She refolded her knees, 
propped her chin in her palms, slapped her calves with 
her feather fan, turned her face from Higgs. 

“The night Rose met up with John Dawn—only sixteen 
she was then; ah, well I remember!—she was wearing a 
little gown didn’t cost a cent more’n a dollar and a half. 

orse luck for her! And it happened things turned out, 
and as eventualities came to pass, ’twould have been better 
for her she hadn’t been wearing anything. 


FALLEN FLOWER 


49 


“Was he the sort of fellow to marry a girl like Rose—?” 

“I didn’t ask,” Maveen broke in curtly. 

“But I’m asking. He was not the sort. Always a go- 
to-the-devil, wild, rough-riding sort of moving pitcher ac¬ 
tor, thinking as much of hisself as if he was Douglas Fair¬ 
banks. And he never had no money. You bet I did my 
best to make Rose see him in his true light! You may 
talk about the war all you want to, about the artorcities, 
and the torpeding of the Louvain, and the rotten dyes we 
got to use these days, but there’s one good thing it did. 
It put an end to John Dawn!” 

Lawless Western grimness lay over Higgs, that hard-lifed 
lady. Maveen flashed a glance at her. Maveen was a little 
frightened. 

“He never could buy all the perty diddles a young girl 
likes and wants and desires, and which your farther’ll get 
for her. Hisself to me Mr. Grady has said: ‘I’ll pour 
out money like water, Mrs. Higgs, to make Rose happy.’ ” 

“Father’s a good talker,” said Maveen, edging away. 
“If he’d said he’d pour it out like liquor, it’d mean more.” 

Mrs. Higgs thought Maveen was disrespectful to her 
elders, a crime the Higgsian conscience could not abide. 
“I know it’s hard on you and your brother, dearie,” she 
said grimly, “that’s growed up since the time your farther 
began making his money with the exportation of having 
it all to yourself. But you’ll have to swallow it. If I 
have anything to say about it—” 

Maveen sneered, almost sticking out her tongue. 

“You’re right! I got a lot to say about it!” shouted 
Higgs. “And I’m going to keep on saying a lot about it, 
for any lip you hand me! Rose married your farther to 
get what John Dawn couldn’t give her. And we’ll get 
it!” 

“You make me sick,” said Maveen, furiously conscious 
that her voice was loud, that Laurence Spencer was look¬ 
ing at her. 

“You may be sicker yet, dearie. We’re married now, 


50 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


whatever comes of it! As Bellbender said: 4 What God 
has joined together, let no man put to slumber.’ ” 

Maveen’s temper, fierce and mad as that of her father, 
overwhelmed her. She seemed ready, in the purpling of 
her face, in the clawing of her hands, in her muttered 
words, to tear out Mrs. Higgs’s honest eyes. 

What deaths might have come of it can’t be known. 
At once came a noisy silence in music, a swirl and scuffling 
among the dancers, a cry. Bravely Rose Grady had danced 
with Todd, van Chueh, Arsen, and the rest; while her 
face grew whiter and whiter, till it was whiter than paper, 
and no blood seemed to pulse from her heart. Yet through 
it all hysterically gay. 

Laughing at Todd, or trying to, she fell. Todd’s arms 
could not seize her quick enough. Her curly golden head 
cracked heavily on the scuffed waxy floor. Full length 
she lay, eyes closed, her funeral black dress like a shroud. 

“Poisoned!” 

Todd stood still, too dull of thought to bend and lift 
her. Laurence Spencer carried her away in his strong 
arms. “Nothing serious, nothing serious,” Dr. Spencer 
puttered. “Fatigue, or excitement. Young women will 
go the pace. Well, well!” he stuttered. He flushed at his 
son as his ear lay on Rose Dawn’s slow stirring breast. 

In half an hour Rose Dawn was with her guests again. 


XII. CONSTABLE BURKE 

I F records be kept in Doomsday Book, they will include 
something of good and something of evil which Tim 
Grady had done against his salvation or damnation. 
At one place on the record will be a red line like blood. 

In Ireland a price upon his head. Suns of forty years 
have not obliterated his photograph from handbills in the 
files of the police. “Wanted, for murder!” 

All, murder is a dreadful thing! It graves a crimson 


CONSTABLE BURKE 


51 


cross on the temples, say what you will. He who slays 
with his own hand another man, though he believe not in 
God nor his own soul, yet will be palsied at a strip of 
paper blowing down the street, will bite his fists at the 
sound of wind, will wake and cry aloud at night when 
the lone dog howls! 

Is Cain’s sin no cosmic sin? Are the lives of men so 
thick the tearing off of one of them stirs no passion in the 
stars? I’d not like to risk it. 

For the good he’d done, Tim Grady had made money, if 
that be good; and children, if they be good. Now in his 
old years his money-bags were become nests of vipers; his 
children were to him as the spawn of hate. 

Women and whisky and wrath —old Timothy Grady went 
the way of the flesh. Thinking of him, these words are a 
refrain. Women and whisky and wrath —which was the 
greater passion I don’t know. All gave him delight. All 
were (as men say) his soul. 

The flesh is corruptible; and it perishes, the desire of 
it, the fairness of it, the strength of it. Its ways are 
thorny ways to go, and lead to the alkali deserts of Ge¬ 
henna. 

For Tim Grady those deserts were near. Within the 
night, upon the black sea, Timothy Grady heard the voice 
of God prophesying to him of death. Or was it only his 
own Fear, which serves each man for God? 

Now is old Tim more drunken. Now are his hands shak¬ 
ing. Why is he so dreadfully wary of the innocuous moon, 
which burns its pathway west across the Hudson? It 
works no harm, save to lunatics. 

‘ ‘ Listen Ike ! I think I hear a noise above! ’ ’ 

“The wind,” says Ike Duval. 

“Then ’tis a cold wind.” 

“The winter wind.” 

Tom Jefferson says nothing. His somber eyes are still 
morose. He is blood of Ethiopia, a king! He remembers 
Tim’s blow. 


52 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Don t yon be worried, Mr. Grady,” Ike says in amuse¬ 
ment. With your sets of burglar alarms, and me and 
Tom to keep an eye open, you couldn’t be bitten by a bed¬ 
bug. No one can break in here.” 

No one. But up in Tim’s chambers a man walks 
softly around. And the speared light of the filling 

moon breaks in through an unshaded window. Red 
moon! . . . 

Ah, long ago it was—forty years—in County Cork, in 
Ireland, loung Tim Grady and his auld man sat down 
at night to drink the world under. A bottle of the waters 
of life was atwixt Tim Grady and his auld man. Which 
bottle passed to a gurgling grave—and another—and yet 
again. Stars blew that night, planets flamed, comets 
wheeled. Burned a crimson moon, sent, I doubt me not 
by the English. 

The spirit of the red-headed man arose in Tim Grady and 
his auld man. They mused of ancient battles. Tears in 
their eyes; braggart oaths; the lust to smite. They called 
on the soul of Brian O’Boru, and lifted their arms in war. 

Ihis was betwixt the dark and the dawn, and the full moon 
shone. 


All would have been well, but Constable Burke, neigh¬ 
bor to the Gradys, intruded in the private family fight. 
He was ill-advised. His head was caught beneath two 
splintering bottles. He went down beneath a stamping of 
teet.—bo he was no more. 


® mms McGmty, a neighbor lad, wanted for theft 
Tim Grady crept from County Cork, from Ireland, like a 
red-headed towering shadow. Arms coiled about his head 

. e , r . an ' H rror la y on him; he blubbered in straw-ricks 
in the day, whined, as he trotted down ghostly roads in 
the night. Dead men swung from nocturnal trees- de¬ 
mons were in the continents of the moon. 

Jest with the sun, west with the bloody moon, Dinnis 
McGmty and he stowed away for America. Ah, long a<m 
U was—forty years. Between lay the long procession of 


CONSTABLE BURKE 


53 


days. Yes, many a star and many a crimson moon had 
grown and blown since then. . . . 

To Tim Grady, riches and power. All which money buys 
he had, much that his heart desired. He had bought love. 
He had effaced his enemies. Yet there was an oblivion 
which could not be bought, a memory which could not be 
effaced! Often in the night (often through those forty 
years of it) came to Tim Grady ghostly vision of Constable 
Burke. In the night, the dead! On the sod floor lying, 
while the bleak bloody moon sketched devils on his face. 
Between the dead man’s staring eyes a worried frown, as 
though not beyond the ultimate veil could he be entirely 
freed from the economic worriment over his wife and 
childer. His nose broken by a boot. Blood frothy on his 
lips. 

It is surprising, perhaps, that Tim Grady had not done 
other murders. 

Here stands Timothy Grady! Loud, ignorant, lecherous, 
jovial, superstitious, wrathy, conceited, generous, quick¬ 
witted, arrogant. A tall, strong man near to sixty years, 
the life so thick in his veins it is purple. His hands are 
huge, they could batter down a door. Or so they once 
could. But now the old heart is not so steady. Is not 
so steady. 

No braver man ever rushed with bull roars into a fight. 
No greater skulking coward ever howled at a mouse’s pat¬ 
ter in the dark. 

And now about him, life at apogee. . . . His marriage 
night, whereby man cheats mortality. . . . His guests move 
about with the humming of flies. . . . Violins pin-pank! as 
musicians strum them for the next dance. . . . Brazen 
lights of ten thousand candles shine. . . . Laughter rises, 
shrill as crickets beating in sudden song. . . . Old Tim 
Grady is drinking yet. He is a little unsteady. 

Drinking yet. To the last he will be drunk. Washael! 
That is a good way to go out into the much traversed 
dark! 


54 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


XIII. CLAY GRIPS THE KNIFE 

T PIE hour was half between midnight and morn. 

That withering moon fled down the froth of the 
stars. It grew redder with its setting, 
iiie jazz orchestra, rumbling of the jungle, made whir¬ 
ring notes like the rapid drumming of a love-sick groused 
wing, an aphrodisiacal song. Tim Grady, pacing uneasily 
from ball room to library, upstairs and down, stopped now 
again to watch the dancing. 

Yhy, he himself had never yet embraced Rose Dawn 
so close, so sweet; had never drunk the glances of her 
marvelous blue eyes with such intensity of desire. Had 
he married her that Arsen, Schermerhorn, van Chuch, 
Higgleson Todd, and the rest of the pack of fools should 
pass her around like a common thing, her bosom never 
cooling from their embraces ? It was his wife, it was his 
liquor, which lent joy to their feet. 

.He was rubbed raw with suspicions bitterer than salt. 
Tim cuised the world, cursed women, cursed his bride, 
with the curse of Cromwell. He left the ballroom, stalk¬ 
ing with his bodyguards to his own rooms in the front of 
the house. This house was new. Old ghosts live in old 
houses, but they are too old to prowl abroad. 

Tom Jefferson examined the west window fastenings at 
Tim Grady s command. Beneath those windows was the 
carriage entrance; the porte-cochere roof served for bal¬ 
cony. Night seemed pale beside Tom’s countenance as he 
drew aside the shade and peered out. Superstitions older 
than man’s oldest wisdom played in the corners of his eyes. 

Old Tim hung over a table to pour seltzer and rye. Ca- 
rate and siphon were ornaments missing in few rooms of 
Dawnrose. His hands were none too steady, for he had 
done this thing this night before. He lifted his glass 
To him, ere drink had touched his lips, came by some 
quirk of mind horrible remembrance of Constable Burke. 


CLAY GRIPS THE KNIFE 


55 


iWhite that worried face, yet duller than clay. Words of 
the dead rang in Tim Grady’s ears. 

While Grady was in the grip of this dismal recollection, 
old Thornwood Clay, who had been drowsing and awaiting 
Grady in a huge fireside wing-chair, arose and came up 
behind. Tim saw him in a mirror. No ghost, but Thorn- 
wood Clay, though his face was livid as a tombstone. In 
the mirror Tim’s stultified eyes beheld close at his shoul¬ 
der the face of Clay, white and damned. 

For a space Grady remained rock still, his heart swell¬ 
ing and dying. The horror of dead ghosts was on him. He 
had not thought before that Clay’s face was so like the 
constable’s. Probably it was not like, but memory had 
faded. To old Tim they were one and the same. In his 
madness he thought that dismal face was borne upon no 
shoulders, but upon blank pillows of air, being the dis¬ 
severed head of that long dead policeman come back to 
gibber him to insanity. The illusions of existence passed 
from old Timothy Grady. He knew that time and space 
are nothing, and that he dwelt in Hell. 

He did not know that he opened his lips, but he roared, 
and roared again, with bellows which shook his guests from 
their smooth priapean dances. 

Old Tim, seizing hard on the table’s edge, came back to 
his senses. It had been but a flash of the “trembling 
delirium.” Those staring eyes were alive, the brain behind 
had sense. It was nothing more than Thornwood Clay. 
The room was alive with pulsing hearts. 

“Is that you, Thorn Clay?” Grady’s voice was a hoarse 
whisper. ‘ ‘ Is that yourself, yourself ? ’ ’ 

“I’m sorry I startled you, Grady. Your man at the 
door told me to come up here. I must have fallen asleep.” 

Old Clay jerked at the lapels of his morning coat, and 
waited an invitation to sit down. Grady rapped his 
knuckles on the table, shivering. “Uh! Uh!” Fie was 
still frightened. 

Thornwood Clay sat down without invitation, crossing 


56 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


his legs elegantly, pressing his palms together beneath his 
chin. He and Grady had once been partners in business 
ventures which always miserably failed, and the superior¬ 
ity he had assumed at that time towards Grady had never 
left Clay. Of Grady’s later riches he was contemptuous, 
Grady’s charity he hated while he took it. 

“What do you mean by prowling around my house like 
a leprechaun?” yelled old Tim, furiously angry, master of 
himself again. “Do ye think I am a babe in ar-rms to be 
frightened by your creepy ways?” 

“Great Judas, Grady! I had no intention of scaring 
you.” 

Old Tim foamed and snarled to quell the fright yet bub¬ 
bling in his heart. “What have ye sn’aked in to stale 
from me on Christmas Ave, on me wedding night?” he 
cried, in brogue almost unintelligible. 

An ill thing for anyone to frighten Tim Grady. An ill 
time for old Thornwood Clay to intrude with his beggar’s 
whine. 

‘ ‘ I insist I had no intention of startling you, Mr. Grady. 
I merely dropped in to see—to see—” Clay hemmed and 
paused. 

1 1 S-spit it out! Don’t mumble and grumble to me! ’ ’ 

“Well, what the devil, Grady!” Clay had a flash of 
anger, but it faded. 

Tim stood over him, glaring so malignantly down on 
Clay’s thin gray hairs it might well seem he had a special 
murderous hatred of each thin gray hair. “What the divil 
yourself?” Tim growled. 

“My money has gone, Mr. Grady, I don’t know where. 
I find myself in very sorry financial straits. I must have 
money. It is imperative that I have money!” 

Imperative, is it?” Tim drawled, narrowing his eyes. 
“Didn’t ye get your graft today from Todd? Where’s 
all the money I’ve handed out to ye, eight thousand dol¬ 
lars a year?” 

Thornwood Clay did not care to dwell on the matter. 


CLAY GRIPS THE KNIFE 


57 


Since he and Grady had been partners in business which 
had swallowed all Clay’s fortune, he considered that half 
of Grady’s later wealth was justly his. But he knew 
Grady might look upon it differently. 

“I don’t wish to emphasize my personal difficulties,” 
Clay said wearily. ‘‘But a demand has been put on me 
which must be met. Met, I say, at once ! ’ ’ 

“I hear ye.” 

‘ ‘ Dollar for dollar, it must be met! ’ ’ 

“Well?” 

‘ ‘ That’s all. It’s plain. A gentleman must have money, 
and I haven’t a cent. That’s true, Grady. Doesn’t it 
sound absurd ? I haven’t got a nickle; I couldn’t buy a 
newspaper.” Clay tried to smile buoyantly; he waved his 
hand as if he told a witty jest. “ It’s amusing. Of course 
a gentleman must have money. You can understand that, 
Grady. It isn’t reasonable to expect a gentleman to live 
without money.” 

“I’ve been without it, many the day and night,” Tim 
said, with quiet pride. “Up and down I’ve walked the 
streets. I’ve gone to the garbage cans. I’ve thanked God 
for a crust of bread and a rotten turnip.” 

“O, of course, you—” Clay shrugged. 

“Why don’t ye git to war-rk, Clay?” 

‘ ‘ This is no time for silliness. My honor hangs on it. I 
must have funds!” 

Must was a word Tim Grady did not like. His eyes 
grew small. In him was an imp of perversity which 
brooked no command of any sort. 

“I will be satisfied with twenty-two hundred tonight,” 
said Clay. 

“You’d be satisfied, would you?” 

Grady’s thunderous sneer could not be mistaken. Clay 
was aroused. He arose slowly, adjusting his glasses to 
stare at Grady, clasping his hands behind him. “Well, 
it’s my money,” he said. 

“Your money! Getting pretty uppish, ain’t ye, Thorn? 


58 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Do ye mean to say this is all ye sn’aked into my house 
for, to r’il me with your begging yap!” Tim nursed 
himself into a fury. “Your money! I’ll say this is 
pretty! You crazy old loon ! Ye don’t own the shir-rt to 
your back!” 

Such familiarities were vile to old Clay, coming from 
lips so lacking in blue blood. He had always known Tim 
Grady as jovial and generous, even obsequious. Clay’s 
brittle, foolish old pride could tolerate no word of con¬ 
tempt, no lessening of his own vast self-esteem. 

“0, don’t grow indecent, Grady! Is it necessary to 
speak plain facts, to name you a thief in your own home?” 

“What’s this? What’s this?” 

“Let me recall several matters. Weren’t we partners in 
the Florida Oil affair, and in the camera patents? How 
does it happen then that you are rich, while I’ve lost 
every cent I have?—” 

“You old bucket-shop plunger!” 

“I m a patient man, Grady, and no yelping Jew. But 
I’ve got to a desperate pass. I’m desperate, I say!” 

^ Clay rapped his frail fist on the table. Though Tim 
Grady was bellowing and stamping, his high-pitched, pre¬ 
cise utterance could not be drowned out. It was like a 
violin’s note in drumming. 

Speaking plain facts, such as one gentleman never needs 
do to another, you know you took my money from me. 
You’ve been trying to salve your conscience with this beg- 
garly pittance Todd doles out to me. Eight thousand a 
year! A common dirty mechanic would starve on that! 
Wait! You can’t yell me down, Sir! If you forget your 
position as host, I may ignore mine as guest. You stole 
my money from me. You know it, Tim Grady!” 

Tim choked. He was almost bursting. Facing him, 
shaking, yet dreadfully set of purpose, old Thornwood 
Clay seemed dry and crumbly as a stick of dust. Pouf! 
A breath of wind, and he’d be gone. 

“I stole—stole—stole your money! If I did, I got it. 


CLAY GRIPS THE KNIFE 


59 


And yofi won’t get it! You lizard! You louse! You 
toad! You jackal! You dodo!” 

Tim had a spasm. He waved his fists at Clay’s nose. 
Of faces in the doorway, of whispering voices, mocking 
eyes, Tim was only distantly aware. He did not care if 
the whole world stared. He hated the whole world. It 
is an Irish trick. 

“Out—out—get out o’ me house! If it hadn’t been for 
ye and your Florida Oil I’d been a millionaire tin years 
before. What’s this? What’s this? If ye didn’t wear 
glasses I’d kick your pants! Out! Get out! Out of me 
sight, Thorn Clay, ye and your family and the name and 
the smell of ye! Arrah! I’ll lose holt of meself and 
forgit you’re wearing glasses.” 

“I’m an old man, Grady, past the seventies,” Clay whis¬ 
pered, striving to hold fast to his dignity. “But, by God, 
Sir, I never thought to live to hear a man speak this way 
to me ! ’ ’ 

i 1 Get out! ’ ’ 

“Do you know I am Thornwood Clay, born of the Clays? 
Do you remember you are addressing a gentleman? I 
came here with a reasonable demand—” 

“Ye’ll make no demands of me! Get out! Out, ye 
auld gray fool!” 

“I’m a gentleman, Sir! You will listen to me. I came 
from the Clays, a line of gentlemen who were never 
either beggars or fools. I am a Clay, Sir, of the Clays! 
My father was—” 

“I heard ye the first time!” old Grady screeched. 
“Your father was a Clay, and your grandfather was a 
Clay, and—God ! God help us, Clay! ’ ’ 

Thornwood Clay stood rigid, formal as a hollyhock. 
People were watching, sneering, listening, he knew; but to 
him, as to Grady, they were a blur. 

“The Clays, Sir, as you may have had the honor of 
being informed— The Clays, Sir, pay their debts— The 
Clays, Sir, as the whole world knows—” 


60 ONCE IN A RED MOON 

If ye didn’t wear glasses I’d cut off your ears!” Tim 
howled. 

The Clays, Sir, don’t cheat, and they don’t shout, and 
they don’t wave their fists like ruffians—” 

‘ ‘ Who >s shouting now ? ” Grady bellowed. ‘ ‘ Who’s wav¬ 
ing their fists? ’ He shook his freckled paws. “Who’s 
cheating? Who’s a liar—who’s a dog—who’s a crook— 
who’s a dirty, black-tailed scalawag?” 

Speak for yourself, Sir. The Clays, Sir, have always 
been gentlemen.” 

Gintlemen! Gintlemen! To the hogs with all your 
gintlemen! 1 e bet I ’ll speak for meself, and so rapid you 

won t know what hit ye! If ye didn’t wear glasses, 
ye lousy-headed runt— I know how to talk like a gintle- 
man, ye swine! Get out! Gintlemen! Gintlemen f 
O, the dirty Clays! Get out! What’s the Grady’s 
been, if they ain’t been gintlemen, with me ancistor 

Water?’’ R ° ry l0rd may ° r ° f Bally by Done ^ al 

Solemn Ike Duval wrapped his arms about his stomach to 
hold his laughter down. In black Tom’s eyes burned an 
entrancing light, the beacon blood of war. 

Par away the orchestra still tootled the Indigestion Blues, 
with a weariness supernal, with discord never faltering! 
But the dancing had stopped. Curious and frightened 
y the uproar coming from Tim’s room, guests were scurry- 
mg on with their wraps and to the outer door. There 
they waited for their cars, cocking ears to the tumult from 
above with as much gawping curiosity as though they were 

a dirty little gang of muckers, and not the cream of 
society. 

Several people were pressing into the entrance of 
Grady s room-Todd, Spencer, Bellbender, Arsen, such as 
by professional position felt themselves entitled to witness 
family fights. They delicately scuffled, drawing back, each 
one of the four learned professions striving to enter not 
rst. Over their heads Maveen Grady peered, biting her 


CLAY GRIPS THE KNIFE 


61 


lips; in tow she had a momentary cavalier, Captain van 
Chuch. Dr. Spencer felt he ought to caution Grady 
about exciting that fierce old heart; but Grady’s patronage 
was worth twenty thousand a year, and he had a son in 
Harvard, a wife with a passion for diamonds. No one 
spoke. 

“What ha’ the Grady’s been, if they ain’t been gintle- 
men?” howled Tim again, pushing his hand against old 
Clay’s breast. “If ye wasn’t wearing glasses, I’d skin 
ye!” 

Stony white was Clay’s face. Illimitable pride was his, 
the vastest pride in the whole universe, and the silliest, 
his honor in the deathly dead. The very ancient and 
honorable Clays raised not one of them a bony hand to 
aid him, though he looked to them for strength. Bah! 
They could not break a cricket’s leg, the whole ghostly 
pack of ’em. 

“Out! Out ye go! The Grady’s ain’t gintlemen, 
ain’t they? You pig—you swine—you gray old hog! I’ll 
gintleman you! I ’ll show ye what a gintleman is! If ye 
wasn’t wearing glasses—” 

Deliberately little old Clay removed his gold-rimmed 
glasses. He danced about, his arms waving like a spider’s 
before him. Crack! His thin, brittle fist pushed out, 
hitting Tim square on his hooked nose. Blood spurted. 
Tim’s shirt was polka-dotted with red. 

“You march right in there and stop Grady up quick!” 
Mrs. Higgs, in the doorway, commanded Bose. “Slap his 
face for him. Start him right. He’s making a arful fool 
o’ hisself.” 

Bose Dawn was dizzy; the world swam around her. 
She felt in presentiment Tim’s big red hands striking her 
face. 

With her elbows Higgs forced entrance to the room be¬ 
tween Spencer and Bellbender. “ I ’ll learn him! ’ ’ she 
said. “I ain’t afraid o’ him.” 

All bloody of face, old Tim Grady seized Clay by the 


62 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


throat. His hands dug in. He grunted and roared. 
Clay, older and vastly less powerful than Grady, gagged, 
fighting outward with useless hands. Blue veins swelled 
on his livid forehead. He sw T ept his arms outward, as 
does a swimmer who is drowning. 

Grady’s fury had stirred a like passion in Maveen, mad 
hatred of the insanity which was her heritage. Stamping 
her foot, jerking her head, she watched her father shake 
and throttle Clay, forcing him back towards a window. 

Isn’t he a fool?” Maveen asked herself over and over, 
twisting her fingers for the shame of it. “Isn’t he a 
fool, an utter fool?” 

With horror she realized she had spoken aloud, as though 
another tongue had seized the thought in her brain, 
clamoring it. Peter van Chuch leaned over her elbow 
agreeably: “Pardon me?— Yes, isn’t he?” Van 
Chuch was pleased to have been taken into Maveen’s confi¬ 
dence. 

“You fool!” Maveen flung back at him, injuring his 
good Dutch soul. 

She was furious with him, furious with herself, furious 
with the great universe and the God who laid the madness 
on the Gradys. Van Chuch looked like a spanked pug- 
dog. In his dour memory van Chuch put Maveen down 
for a black mark. The fury of van Chuchs is cold, but 
burns forever. 

“Get off! Get away! Get out!” Tim screeched, sniff¬ 
ing the blood which streamed from his nose, pushing old 
Clay towards the windows. 

Mrs. Higgs grasped Tim by the collar band. She tried 
to shake that big bull. “You’re making a monkey of 
yourself, Timothy Grady! Behave yourself! People is 
looking at you. Behave yourself!” 

“Get out!” 

That howl bowled over nine men like nine-pins. Tim 
Grady threw a look so fierce, so threatening, malignant, on 
the crowded faces in the doorway that each little face 


CLAY GRIPS THE KNIFE 


63 


thought itself singled out for injury, and folded up in its 
own shell. 

Now what scuffling, as Law, Theology, Medicine, Journal¬ 
ism, crawl crab-wise back through the door! What 
kicked shins! What trodden corns! What stomachs 
dented by what elbows! No hesitation now at which 
should be first, for all would be first. 

Mrs. Higgs tightened her hold in Tim’s collar. ‘‘Don’t 
you think you’re going to bully me!” cried she. “Not in 
my own home. Behave yourself! ’ ’ 

Tim bent, dragging Higgs from the floor. He swung 
her off his shoulder. His elbow caught the lady beneath 
the chin. And her legs went up and her head went down. 
And she cracked to the floor with a howl. 

Ike Duval, .sworn to uphold the law as interpreted by 
clients of the Argus Agency, did not raise one finger as 
Clay was shaken and choked like a dead cat. Wigley 
Arsen, who made it his boast he knew all the great, who 
had in more prosperous days bowed and smirked to Thorn- 
wood Clay’s proud back, now had the decency, as he 
watched from the safety of the hall, to grimace with 
disgust. 

“Ga! Ga!” Clay groaned. 

And whether he was trying to call to God, or merely 
wishing for more breath, was not plain. Blood from Tim’s 
flowing nose speckled his thin hair. 

Stumbling backward, from a table his insensate fingers 
picked up a weapon. Hjs fingers closed; they held. 
Feebly fighting, he lifted up a knife. The knife Tim 
Grady bought from Bliss’s pawnshop for eighteen bar¬ 
gained dollars; the knife Lopez stole from John Dawn; 
the weapon of the dead! Its gold-green serpent bit the 
pads of old Clay’s grasping hand. 

Up, flashing, at Tim Grady’s breast the heavy blade 
pointed. 

A blow from Grady on Clay’s arm. The knife went 
spinning from Clay’s lax fingers. High, in an arc. With 


64 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


a hoarse grunt Ike Duval dropped to the floor. The 

serpent knife flashed over his head. Point first it drove 
into the floor. 

Roaring mad, Tim pushed old Clay against a window. 
The window hangings fell in a cascade. The window 
shade buckled and tore, jerked from its roller. The win¬ 
dow pane caved outward with a boom, followed by a 
tinkle of showered glass shards. The window alarm broke 
out in fierce jangling, sending warnings sharp as arrows 
forth against the stars. 

“Get out!” Tim screeched triumphantly. 

And Clay was out. He’d been pushed clear through. 
Down the sloping porte-cochere roof he slid, clawing like 
a cat. Departing guests, awaiting their cars below, 
loosened a hubbub of chilly murmurs at that slipping, 
slithering, clawing sound. The wild Irish was off again. 
No one knew what might come of it. 

“There!” Grady stuck his head through the broken 
window, shaking a fist as Clay sprawled down. 4 4 Bide 
there till great earth rots!” 

Out alone in the crackling frost, the merciless night, 
the exceeding great cold of Christmas morning. Thrown 
like a beggar from a gentleman’s house, to share the 
night with the rats and the bats. 

The full blown moon shone carmine. Over the hills, 
over the river, shone the full blown moon, a frozen peony 
in the fields of the west. 

And ye, damn ye!” Grady shrieked, at the moon, or 
chaos, or Divinity, or at some ghost which fluttered in the 

night and was seen to his eyes alone. 4 'I’m not afraid 
of ye! ” 

. Something unseen struck Tim Grady in his oathing and 
his strength. He collapsed over the window-ledge, groan¬ 
ing. His face was white, and blood dripped from his 
nose as from a leaky faucet. 

That old heart will crack on him some day,” Dr. 
Spencer muttered to Higgleson Todd. 


CLAY GRIPS THE KNIFE 


65 


“Anything serious? No danger of his dying?” 

“He’s got a chance to outlive his wife, and you, and me,” 
said Spencer. “But he may not do it.” 

The square-faced lawyer bent his brows. He seemed 
about to say something, but refrained. Black Tom lifted 
up his master, carrying him to bed. Once or twice Tim 
Grady groaned, but it didn’t do him any good. 

So passed the night and morning of his wedding night. 
Mrs. Higgs slept with Rose. 


XIV. INTO THE DARK 

A S on a greased chute Thornwood Clay slid down 
the porte-cochere roof. His neat feet dangled 
over the edge. For an instant he hung back 
from the drop, feebly striving to dig his fingers into the 
tiles. His shoulders followed his feet, and he took the 
sharp drop to the ground. 

“Dollar for dollar,” he mumbled dizzily, feeling his 
forehead, trying to locate the cord of his lost eyeglasses. 
“The Clays, Sir, have always been gentlemen. ... You 
insufferable, insufferable bounder. ... I demand my 
money!” 

His hand came away red from his forehead; raw cuts 
of the window-glass burned with cold. He sat down on 
the ground, in the snow. 

Ike Duval, fearing murder, crawled out on the roof, 
peering over. Clay sat with his back against a pillar of 
the porte-cochere. His shoulders sagged; his head lay on 
one side. He was dreadfully weary. 

“Ahoy below! All right?” 

From Clay’s closed lips came no answer to the hired 
guard of Tim Grady save the supreme answer, the final 
boast of the proud—silence. 

Loud through the night, sharp as the crack of the stars, 
Saltpeter called motor-cars up to the entrance. “Mister-r 


66 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Bon-nell! Mister-r Todd-d! Miss-ess Wi-hi-hi-higgs! ’’ 

The guests, eager to be gone, flowed out through the 
doorway. No one spoke a word to old Thornwood Clay, 
who had fallen so abruptly raindroppishly into view and 
now sat with back to them. Distinguished in his day he 
had been, his very engraved card an honor on any silver 
tray. But the days go by—his day was done. And they 
were children of the night. 

In the door or on the steps silk hats shining; coats of 
ermine and sable; scarves, blue, pink, or gold chiffon over 
carefully molded coiffures; red rubbed eyes; flash of 
walking sticks; a lady in hysterics; a lady in intoxication ; 
frosty breath puffing out like engine exhausts; Buddy 
Schermerhorn, one owl eye cocked, towering up like a 
flagpole; bumbling buzz of voices; great grewsome yawns; 
cheeks pink and nippy beneath powder. 

Mrs. Tiffany Bonnell murmured to many sympathetic 
ears that, by the soul and honor of that great cousin-in- 
law’s husband who was a Sir, she’d never set foot in such 
an ill-bred house again. Mrs. Wiggs intermittently tossed 
out her scrawny neck, lifted up her beady eyes, like a 
chicken sipping water; it expressed her highest disdain. 
"Where do we go from here?” Schermerhorn gagged. 
And that was a question. 

Dozing chauffeurs scrambled from the servants’ entrance 
one by one, wrapping coats about their ears for fear of the 
almighty frost. They fell into their cars, and, spinning 
their engines with pumping thumps, tornadoed up to the 
porte-cochere. 

Dr. Bellbender, delayed inside by aiding old Tim to bed, 
left last. He was a kindly man, well-meaning. Crossing 
the drive, he bent down to old Clay with a gentle tap on 
the shoulder. He cleared his throat for speech. Bell- 
bender recalled days when most hallowed in the sight of 
Heaven was that church from whose pews the Clays spoke 
with God. 

"Can’t my driver take you home, Mr. Clay?” 


INTO THE DARK 


67 


Old Clay looked dizzily about him, blind without glasses, 
wiping his forehead again. The cuts on his face had frozen 
to black drops. Stupidly he peered at his palm. “ Leave 
me alone, please.’’ 

And fell into taciturnity so bleak, so profound and 
blank, that Bellbender felt himself insulted, and turned 
away with a snuff. 

Proud were the Clays, sire and son, proud with their 
pride in the dead. Old Governor Clay, old Speaker Clay, 
old Ambassador Clay, old Thornwood Clay, had held them¬ 
selves in their esteem above the kings of earth. Yet in the 
days of their utmost grandeur was none of them more filled 
with pride than old Thornwood Clay, sitting silently in the 
snow at the threshold of his enemy. Hollow, leer, bubble 
pride, as empty as an old tin can. 

Saltpeter warily watched the old man. Once or twice 
he thought of calling for Ike; but old Clay apparently 
meant no harm. He sat motionless while full a quarter 
hour passed, looking at shadows in the sky, thinking 
thoughts long as space and multitudinous as the stars. 

Ike Duval slipped on black derby and belted green 
overcoat, emerging for a breath of air. His jowls were set 
and lowering. He paused to borrow a cigaret from Salt¬ 
peter, giving Clay a wise glance. “Pretty cold night, 
brother. ” 

“It ain’t so much the cold as it’s the chilliness,” Salt¬ 
peter replied. 

Ike gave him a sharp look, painfully pondering this word 
of wisdom. “I seen a lot colder nights that wasn’t so 
cold,” he said grimly. 

“And I seen a lot of nights that wasn’t so cold that was 
colder, ’ ’ Saltpeter insisted. ‘ ‘ Say, I seen some fellow hid¬ 
ing out in front. I’d like to go out and hand him a good 
swift kick, only I belong inside the house.” 

“Scared, are you?” 

“Scared! Who’s scared? You’re scared.” 

“I’ll go out and look him over, Fish-face,” said Solemn 


68 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Ike. “I don’t want you to tremble yourself to death on 
your feet.” 

“It’s the cold,” said Saltpeter. “And the chilliness.” 

Hunching his shoulders, Ike Duval strode bravely forth. 
Always brave. As in a dark vision Saltpeter saw the un¬ 
known watcher emerge from shadows of bushes—saw Ike 
running forward, fierce as leaping cougar, his hand reach¬ 
ing towards his hip—saw them meet, saw them merge in 
shadows. Umbers of gaunt winter-withered trees wrapped 
them round. 

Thereafter no word, no sound. Only the shadow. 

And the butler watched for long. But Ike Duval did 
not come back into the light again, not he, nor his black 
derby, nor his solemn green overcoat brightening the mid¬ 
night. The hour grew late, the shadows blacker. 

“Guess he knows his business,” Saltpeter thought. “It 
ain’t none o ’ my business. ’ ’ His knees shook, for far away 
he heard a dog howling. 

He made ready to bar the door. “Good-night to you, 
Sir! he called to Thornwood Clay. No word answered 
him, but only the supernal arrogance of indifference. Clay 
stumbled to his feet and silently crept over the snow, 
tracing a dizzy arc. Saltpeter muttered something about 
the proud as he locked and double-locked the door. 


XV. MORNING MIST 

A ND the night lies. Old Tim groans all night long. 
Shadows pass about his home. Dreams come. 
Rose Dawn sleeps alone. 

And the night passes. This is Christmas morning. 

A newspaper is a mighty thing. Nothing greater except, 
perhaps, the dinosaur, and it’s dead. 

In the Morning Mist the whole world comes neatly 
wrapped. For two cents you can have floods, politics, 


MORNING MIST 


69 


Russian wars, Irish jubilations, strikes, scandals of the 
always delightfully scandalous rich, want ads, obituaries, 
tooth-paste advertisements, empires and republics swiftly 
nethergoing, the dubious destinies of God. For two cents 
—He knows what you’d get for a nickle. 

The tune the corner newsies wearily chaunted, in ever¬ 
lasting paean, in universal Christmas carol, was that news 
which, above all other in this fierce and teeming world, they 
thought would most satisfactorily palsy the great heart 
of humanity— 

“Fight in a millionaire’s home! Read about Tim 
Grady, the movie magnate ! ’ ’ 

Sleet snow howling down from iron skies. No sun was 
given, and hardly light. A rather tough day for Santa 
Claus and poor little children forced by artists to stare at 
bake-shop windows, but pleasant enough for those whom 
business did not call abroad. The cyclone that blood-red 
moon forespoke was risen. 

Newsboys crouched in subway entrances, whence arose 
a steam of melting snow and the odious odor of wet wool¬ 
ens. Few walked abroad at Christmas noon; fewer bought 
newspapers; the newsboys ’ mythical annual Christmas din¬ 
ner was aided by no funds. 

On the Morning Mist’s society page a column and a half 
about the Grady-Dawn wedding, with names of all who 
were there and of many who weren’t. The clothes de¬ 
scribed were more than the ladies wore. 

In the automobile-for-sale columns notification that Gay 
Deleon, of Park Avenue, would be willing to dispose of his 
custom-built French car. That meant the God of Dice 
was looking illy at Deleon. 

Covering half a page was an advertisement of Rose Dawn 
in the latest Grady super-picture, “Sin,” first metropolitan 
production at the Alhambra Palace. Right across from it 
another, smaller advertisement of a cut-rate department 
store, offering for ninety-eight cents, reduced from five 


70 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


dollars, “My Hero Husband: Life of John Dawn; by Rose 
Dawn.” The ninety-eight cent copies, it was explained, 
were slightly soiled. 

And much robbery; hold-ups; shooting of husbands, 
lovers, and such; old fashioned murders done with an ax. 
Notable account of the arrest of one Lopez, alias Greasy 
Pete, alias the Sieur Nuit, for practicing clairvoyancy 
without contributing to the police fund, and for stealing a 
widow’s pearls. 

Account also of an attempted hold-up of Dr. Russel 
Spencer, of East Fifty-Ninth, on his way back from the 
Grady-Dawn wedding, by one Dinnis McGinty. The doc¬ 
tor had cracked the aspiring robber over the head with his 
automobile fire-extinguisher and taken him to the police 
station, offering in case of cerebral complications develop¬ 
ing to trephine without fee. 

John Dawn Post 3 of the American Legion gives a 
Christmas dinner to cinema actors out of work. Anthony 
Anthony, head of the Argus Agency, has been spoken of as 
chief of the Federal Treasury secret service. Dr. Bell- 
bender, of St. Cecil’s All Souls, will follow his annual cus¬ 
tom and preach a sermon to the poor. Colder to¬ 
morrow. . . . 

Out of Times Square subway exit came three citizens. 
They paused to catch their breath before the blizzard, 
glancing over the newspaper headlines. “Paper?” a boy 
asked. “Two cents. All about the fight in a rich man’s 
home!” 

“Bride Sees Grady War!” 

This the unintelligible heading, epic in its brevity and 
nonsense. 

“Clay Ousted from Grady Home while Society Looks 
On!” 

Wigley Arsen had been inspired to humor. 

“ . . . Grady, known familiarly as ‘Auld Tim’ to the 
Hodcarriers’ Union, remembered the days when he used 


MORNING MIST 


71 


to shovel cement, and shoveled Clay out the window. 
‘Next!’ he yelled, looking for his wife, Rose Dawn. But 
she wasn’t ready to go just yet. Grady’s mother-in-law, 
Mrs. Higgs of Kansas and Illinois, joined gayly in the 
affray. 

“It is rumored offers will be made to Mr. Grady to put 
the act in vaudeville. ...” 

The three citizens bent their heads and plowed down 
Broadway. 

“I wouldn’t be that fellow Grady for ten million dol¬ 
lars!” said Citizen A. “I always held myself a gentle¬ 
man. If I’d been that there Clay I’d sloughed Grady 
in the puss.” Citizen A was a little man, given to 
rickets. 

“It’ll cost him all of ten million to support Rose Dawn,” 
said Citizen B, a very hideous man. “7 wouldn’t ’a’ 
married her. No, Sir! Them sort of women come high. 
They say she uses powdered pearls to take her bath in. 
They say—” 

Citizen B, who was a married man, a gentleman, and a 
Christian, gurgled over scandals so vile they should have 
rotted out his clacking tongue. 

“I don’t believe a word of it!” said Citizen C, who had 
quarrelsome eyebrows. 

“They’re all alike, these movie people,” affirmed A. 
“I’ve got a cousin who knows a fellow whose aunt married 
a man who’s a photographer—” 

“She’d better not try any of her vamping on me” said 
hideous B. 

“Not if she gave me ten billion dollars,” agreed rickety 

A. 

“I don’t believe a word of it!” snarled quarrelsome C. 

Then they, this being Christmas Day, plunged their way 
into the pack standing in the Alhambra Palace foyer, there 
to wait two hours like stifling cattle just to see Rose Dawn 
in “Sin.” 


72 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


XVI. DICTATION! 

H IGGLESON TODD was in a fury, and his ste¬ 
nographer was aware of it. He stretched his 
right fist forth as far as it would go, pounding 
his glass-topped desk. His big bald head shone with in¬ 
dignant sweat. 

“What the devil do you know about this!” The poor 
stenographer, whose frail head was filled with thoughts of 
toddles, vampires, jazz, and fellas, knew nothing; nor was 
she the devil. “You know that lousy, rum-soaked old 
Irishman who’s been coming in here the last five years for 
Grady’s money?” 

“Mr. McGinty, Mr. Todd?” 

“ Mister McGinty, Miss Dubby. I mean McGinty. Din 
—Din—Dinnis McGinty. That beet-faced beetle! That 
loafing blackmailer! That snorty old scalawag—McGinty! 
Do you know whom I mean?” 

“Yes, Sir,” said Miss Dubby, slowly, as great light 
dawned on her. “You mean McGinty!’’ 

“You are right. I mean McGinty. He tried to hold 
up Dr. Spencer Christmas morning near Dawnrose, and 
the good old doc smashed him flat.” 

“Smashed Mr. McGinty?” 

“Smashed McGinty! And now what do you think he’s 
done ?’ ’ 

“What has he done?” breathed Miss Dubby. 

“What do you think he’s done?” roared Todd, who de¬ 
lighted to entice forth the frail little opinions of his ste¬ 
nographer and pounce on them like a cat on a pink babe 
mouse. “What do you think he’s done?” 

“I don’t think,” Miss Dubby gasped. 

“1 T erhum sapientis. Verbum IN sapientis," Todd 

chuckled. 

“Sir?” 

“I say you’re a sap.” He was in better humor; a pun 


DICTATION! 


73 


always makes a man feel good. “When the doc had him 
locked up in some country hoosegow out near Grady’s 
place, he said he was a friend of mine, and that Todd, 
Todd, Todd, and Todd would be his counsel. Damn his 
lying hide! ’ 9 

“I beg pardon?” 

“You don’t need to. I say, damn his lying hide! He 
had letters from me; he had a check from me; he had my 
card. So they released him on my cognizance, on the cog¬ 
nizance of Todd, Todd, Todd, and Todd” (Higgleson spoke 
the words as reverently as though they were initialed with 
a G). “And now they tell me they want me to produce 
him for trial.” 

“Yes, Sir.” 

“What?” 

“No, Sir.” 

“Of course he’s skipped out. But I’m going to comb 
this universe for him. I ’ll set the dogs on him! And 
when I catch him, he’ll hang, if there’s a law in New York 
State!” 

“Yes, Sir.” Miss Dubby patted her back hair, not 
vastly concerned how many old men hanged. 

“Dictation! ‘To Colonel Stoughton Dawn, Biscayne, 
Florida. Dear and so forth. In re your inquiry of re¬ 
cent date concerning royalties accruing to the estate of 
your son, John Dawn—’ ” 

Miss Dubby was fluttering for notebook and pencil. The 
one she located on her lap, the other behind her ear. ‘‘ The 
address, please, again?” 

“What address?” 

“Captain Stoughton’s address.” 

“ Colonel — Dawn! Colonel like in nut.” 

“Dawn like in sky. ‘Dear and so forth—’ ” 

Higgleson Todd prayed. 

“ ‘Dear nut,’ ” fluttered Miss Dubby, in a profusion of 
apology. 


74 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Todd laid his bald head on his tired hands. “Whom 
do the Giants play today, Miss Dubby ? ’ ’ 

“Why, no one, Sir. It’s December.” 

“Are you sure?” 

“Yes, Sir, I think I’m sure.” 

“You think?” 

“Yes, Sir. I think I think.” 

“Good!” Todd grinned like a tiger. “Great!” he 
clapped his hands. “Splendid! Now you chase out and 
see if you know a pen when you see one. Bring it to me. 
I want to write a letter!” 

This was not a good time for old Thornwood Clay to 
enter the Toddian presence. He came softly in, shivering 
a little, coughing, bent of shoulder. There was (out, 
damned spot!) a smut on his collar. 

Higgleson Todd looked gravely up. Todd’s air differed 
subtly from that cheerful cordiality he was wont to show 
to old Thornwood Clay. He was not so certain now that 
the Clays were quite as good as the Todds. The Clays had 
been kicked out. Todd drew circles with his thumb-nail on 
his desk. 

11 1 want to speak to you, Mr. Todd. ’ ’ 

“I see.” 

“I’ve been here before.” 

“I know.” 

Old Clay drew up straightly. He didn’t like to glance 
at his pants, which were uncreased. “It’s a very cold 
day,” he said. 

“Mr. Clay,” boomed the lawyer, placing his forearms 
on his desk and gripping his hands, “there’s nothing I 
can do for you.” Old Clay bowed. “Mr. Grady has been 
so sick I haven’t been able to see him, not even about the 
matter of a new will, which is important. He hasn’t in¬ 
structed me, consequently, to discontinue the—ump—re¬ 
mittances to you. If he does not so instruct, I ’ll have your 
quarterly check for you April first.” 

“April first?” 


DICTATION! 


75 


“That's the date." 

Clay coughed. He sat down, though not invited. His 
hands fumbled restlessly over his thin old knees. Todd 
had never seen him before without a walking stick. Todd’s 
impression was that Clay had suffered amputation of a 
limb. 

“It’s a very cold day,’’ Clay muttered. 

“But Mr. Clay,’’ Todd continued firmly, squeezing his 
interlaced fingers, “I witnessed the altercation—ump— 
between yourself and Mr. Grady Christmas Eve. Am I 
wrong in assuming he does not feel kindly towards you?’’ 

Old Clay pulled his knees. “Great ghosts!" he whis¬ 
pered. “I never thought I’d come back like a kicked dog 
to beg his charity! ’ ’ 

11 Then why do you ? ’ ’ Todd asked with a kind smile. 

Thornwood Clay plucked at his lapels. “It’s a cold—" 

11 Indeed, the weather is quite brisk and seasonal, ’ ’ broke 
in the lawyer, with voice brisk and seasonal. “I don’t 
need to tell you, Mr. Clay, that Mr. Grady is a very set 
man. If he takes a disliking to anyone, he never changes. 
Never! In your place, Mr. Clay, I’d rely on other re¬ 
sources." 

Old Clay muttered. “Other resources?" 

“Yes. Your revenues; your invested funds. What 
every man has." 

Long silence. “I will speak plainly to you, Mr. Todd," 
Clay said at last. “(It’s hard to speak plain facts!) 
I’ve thrown away everything. I have nothing. I haven’t 
a nickle!" Clay gasped. Likely if he’d been inured to 
poverty all his life he wouldn’t mind it now, at seventy 
years old; might likely enjoy it; might chuckle over it in 
some old man’s home with a chew of charity tobacco. “I 
haven’t even enough money to wire my son for funds. I 
haven’t got—you understand ?—a eent! ’ ’ 

Todd wove his fingers in and out. He had not thought 
Clay’s affairs quite so bad as that. “Well—the banks. 
Borrow ? ’ ’ 


76 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“I owe thirteen thousand dollars,’’ said Clay quietly, 
“including debts of honor, which must be paid, dollar for 
dollar! Dollar for dollar!” Again on his supercilious 
old face hardened that dreadful murderous look. ‘ ‘ I have 
no one to go to. That’s why I come to you.” 

Todd mumbled and withdrew his face. “I’m sorry Mr. 
Grady— ’ ’ 

“I come to you as a friend, not as to Grady’s lawyer.” 

“Tied up,” said Todd steadily. “First of the year. 
I’m sewed up tight. You know how it is.” 

“I see,” said old Clay, stiffly arising. “Yes, I know 
how it is. Of course. It’s hard to speak plain facts—” 

“ It is, ” said Todd with vast frankness. 

“I’ve been staying in a rooming-house—I’m going to 
speak plain facts—a rooming-house, you understand!” 

“I understand, a rooming-house.” 

“I am a Clay,” the old man gasped. 

“Yes, I know. You are a Clay.” 

Todd’s soothing words did not soothe Clay; they seemed 
rather to irritate. He raised his fist and shouted. “A 
dirty, filthy rooming-house! With truck-drivers, and— 
and a fellow who sells something—and workingmen, and— 
and— ’ ’ 

He ended in a feeble swallow. His knowledge of workers 
did not permit him to catalog any more classes. 

“And chauffeurs,” Todd helped out, though his knowl¬ 
edge, also, of workers was limited. 

“And chauffeurs! But I have no money, not a cent! 
And they’ve turned me out!” 

‘ ‘ They ’ll do that, ’ ’ said Todd. ‘ ‘ They’ve got the law on 
their side.” 

“My creditors have taken all I possess. I haven’t got, 
Sir—I haven’t got another shirt!” 

“Well, well,” said Todd. “But you can only wear one 
at a time. ’ ’ 

“It’s hard to speak plain facts,” Clay said again. Yet 
it was easier than it had ever been before; a couple of 


DICTATION! 


77 


days on an empty belly make facts exceeding plain. “But 
I haven’t got a place to sleep ! I haven’t got—” 

Todd sorted over some papers. “0, Miss Dubby!” he 
called over his shoulder. Miss Dubby slicked in. “Dicta¬ 
tion!” Todd said in parenthesis. “As soon as Mr. Clay— 
0, yes; what were you saying, Mr. Clay?” 

Clay spoke bravely out; strange words these, not known 
to the proud lexicon of the Clays. “I’d be obliged for a 
small personal loan, Mr. Todd. The Clays are good for 
any amount. Dollar for dollar, we pay our debts!—” 

He waited, bowing slightly. Save for the shadow of his 
outward pride, he was no more the Thornwood Clay of a 
week before than he was the ghost of G. J. Cassar. 

Higgleson Todd thought of the honor of the Clays, and 
he thought of old favors accepted, and of old friendship. 
And he thought of his own bank balance. Clay fees had 
made the legal Todds; the first Todd had been pantry-boy 
to old Ambassador Clay; out of the scullery he’d been 
taken up to honor the heights of the law. Todd thought 
of old friendship, and of old favors accepted, and of the 
honor of the Clays. He grew ashamed. His eyes faltered. 
'Sweat was on his bald head. But he remembered his own 
bank balance. 

“See if you can get that letter to Colonel Dawn straight 
now! ’ ’ the lawyer snarled at Miss Dubby. * ‘ 0, Clay. I’m 
damned sorry, Clay—” 

The old man gripped his hat. “I’m not a beggar, Sir!’’ 
he said. 

And turned, and strode forth from out that place. 

Something magnificent in that exit; something Roman 
and heroic. He was a Clay, and old Speaker Clay, old 
Senator Clay, old Ambassador Clay would not have been 
shamed of him. No, nor the devils of Hell, who plot 
murder. 

“Dictation! Dictation!” Todd called, to yell down his 
own shame. 

“Maybe he’s not a beggar now,” Todd thought, “but he 


78 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


will be. He’s too easily got rid of. I ’d have given him a 
hundred if he’d squawked a little more!’’ 

He turned to Miss Dubby, who waited with pencil poised. 
“Was I a little abrupt with you a while ago, Mary?” he 
asked gently. 

The visit of Clay had put him in good humor. He 
reached forth a square right hand and patted her on the 
knee. The girl clutched her note-book to her breast. In 
his eyes she saw that light more terrible than all his wrath! 


XVII. THE RICH UNCLE 

O LD Clay stumbled steadily from Trinity Place 
up Broadway. Miles of pavement, cold and 
stone. He did not know where he went. Win¬ 
ter night dropped on him near Times Square. His knees 
shook; he felt that he was sawed in two. The odors of a 
bakery-restaurant made him sick to vomiting. 

Down Broadway came three citizens. “Old gent’s 
drunk,” said Citizen A.—“Awash to the scuppers,” said 
Citizen B, who had been a yeoman in the Navy and was 
saltier than the ocean.—“I don’t believe a word of it!” 
C scowled, snarling his straight black brows. 

They stopped to watch old Clay feeling his way down a 
curbing. They nudged elbows and winked. In one half 
minute a hundred gapers gathered about, all staring at 
whatever it was at which the three citizens were staring. 
A traffic officer moved over, patting his stomach. 

“Wha’s matter, Mister?” asked Citizen C. He sniffed, 
turning in argumentative triumph to his two confreres. 
“He ain’t drunk; what’d I say?” 

“Young man!” Clay gasped. (“Yes, Sir!” said C, all 
attention.) “It’s a very silly thing—” (“Well, Sir?” 
said C.) “But to speak plain facts, which are very hard 
to speak—” (“Indeed they are, Sir!” said C, while A 
and B nodded.) “To speak plain facts, I’m hungry!” 


THE RICH UNCLE 


79 


C scratched his head. The others looked surprised. 

Why don’t you get some chow?” he asked. 

“1 beg your pardon?” 

Why don’t you feed your face?”—“Why don’t you 
grub?” A explained, anxious, like all puny men, to be 
heard. 

Clay heard a terrible laugh, but he did not know it came 
from his own lips. He was quite sure now he was not 
Thornwood Clay. Why, Thornwood Clay would no more 
have stopped to pour his troubles in the ears of three com¬ 
mon fellows than he would have—than he would have 
starved. He wondered where Thornwood Clay had gone, 
and looked around in the wall of faces for the proud 
countenance of Thornwood Clay. 

“Young men, I haven’t got a nickle!” 

“Gee, that’s tough!” said A. 

“Pretty rotten. Out of luck. Up the creek,” said B. 

“I don’t believe a word of it!” said C. “Why don’t 
you hock some of your jewelry? That ring and that 
watch and Lord knows what-all cigaret cases and cigar- 
clippers and solid gold note-books you’ve got would give 
you a good stake.” 

“He’s right, old fellow,” said A. “Go to your rich 
uncle.” 

Old Clay heard ringing in his ears. “My rich uncle! 
—You mean the Senator? Why, he’s been dead forty 
years; and all his money went on the races.” 

“Cuckoo!” said A, tapping his feeble skull. 

B smirked his hideous face. “A wormy chestnut,” he 
opined. 

“I don’t believe a word of it!” said C. “Here you, 
old guy. You’ve never been up against it before, I’ll 
bet. Your rich uncle’s a pawn-broker—see? You just 
go to him, any place on Seventh or Eighth Avenues, and 
pass over your jewelry for some jack. He’ll fix you up.” 

The crowd pressed densely around, a wall of open 
mouths. Many bright ladies’ faces were in it, cunning, 


80 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


beautiful, and bold. “The old guy’s broke, Dot,” said 
one fair girl. “No place for us,” said Dot. “We’re 
off.” They shoved their way out of the crowds, Dot’s 
red curls nodding with anger that she had been so long 
delayed, her stumpy legs looking absolutely bare in their 
fawn lace stockings. 

A fat man called: * ‘ Who’s killed ? Is he dead ? Does 
he want a drink?” A silver flask was proffered above 
the heads of the crowd. 

The policeman sauntered up and began to shoulder 
people out of the way. “Cut out this here blocking of 
traffic. What’s the matter? Move on, you. Move on! 
Get out of the way!” 

Thornwood Clay, thus directed to a last recourse of 
which he had never thought, found on Eighth Avenue the 
shop of A. Bliss. Inside was a demi-professional actress, 
haggling for three more dollars on a diamond bar-pin, 
undoubtedly genuine. Twice Clay walked furtively up 
and down before those straight-barred windows, before the 
array of guns, mandolins, and brassy toilet-sets. He 
called up courage; hunger gnawed him. He had now for¬ 
gotten quite the very ancient honor of the Clays, for¬ 
gotten even that he was Thornwood Clay. He entered 
beneath that three-balled sign into the doors without 
hope. 

“Fifty dollars,” Gus Bliss offered for the trinkets on 
the counter. “I’m not buying ’em. Pay interest, and you 
get ’em back. It’s more than I ought to allow, but you 
look honest.” 

Thornwood Clay did not know he was highly compli¬ 
mented. To Gus Bliss, against whom all men set their 
hands, who set his hands against all men, few were those 
who looked honest. Clay had a faint idea the initial cost 
of his trinkets was well more than a thousand dollars. 
He bowed, not squabbling. 

“0 Miss Bliss!” howled Gus.—“Yes, Mr. Bliss!” a 
female voice howled back. A girl with high yellow hair 


THE RICH UNCLE 


81 


and jutting nose appeared from a back room. She was 
sharp and shrewd and cursed the world with her nose. 
“Give the gent fifty dollars, Miss Bliss.”—“Certainly, 
Mr. Bliss.’’ As she passed Gus she muttered: “Wha’ 
jew gi’m so much for?’’—“Mind your own business!” ad¬ 
vised Gus, instantly on the defense. “Ain’t I got a right 
to be a gent once in a while ? ’ ’ 

“But wait!” whispered Clay, not counting the dirty 
fives. His face was working. “I want to get a revolver.” 

“Got your permit?” Clay did not understand. “Got 
to have a permit.” 

11 0 Mr. Bliss! ’ ’ Sadie howled, her voice like the amorous 
cry of a howling female monkey when love time falls on 
the forests. “Go ahead and trust him.” She poked out 
her elbow. “He ain’t no cop. They’s a real pretty gun 
you could sell him for forty—forty-five dollars and not 
lose money on it, Mr. Bliss.” 

She laid out a little tin and mother-of-pearl weapon 
worth about twelve dollars, pawned for two. “I think 
you ought to oblige the gent, Mr. Bliss,” she said, ag¬ 
grieved. “He’s a nice looking old gent, Mr. Bliss.” 

* ‘ Forty dollars, Miss Bliss! Why, that there gun didn’t 
cost—” 

Thornwood Clay paid down the money. “Is that 
right ? ” he asked. 

In his coat pocket he thrust the gun, and his unaccus¬ 
tomed fingers curled round its cold stock. It hardened 
his heart. He thought for a little while he had killed a 
man, and that man was Thornwood Clay. 

“Dollar for dollar!” he muttered crazily. “The Clays, 
Sir, pay their debts.” 

As he passed again the corner of 42nd and Broadway, 
on his way to register at the Hotel Babylon, he saw the 
crowd still shoving and gawping. “Don’t push me,” 
Citizen A crossly admonished Clay, not recognizing him. 
“Some guy’s been hurt here.”—“Some guy’s killed,” said 
B. C snarled that he did not believe a word of it. But 


82 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


all three remained watching, victims of the curiosity they 
had incited. 

The girl in fawn colored stockings bare as flesh hurried 
by, drawing her plush imitation sable coat about her naked 
breast bone. “The old guy again/’ said she. “He’s 
bust. I’d like to make a touch from Deleon.” 

“Try it,” said her friend, laughing harshly. “He’d 
give you a kick, Dot.” 

‘ ‘ 0 God! 0 God! ’ ’ whimpered Dot, as they scurried on. 

“And all the things he promised me. I loved him so!” 

Her friend laughed, for she was a friend. 


XVIII. THE BLACK CAT 

I KE DUVAL, grim and relentless, found Dinnis Mc¬ 
Ginty, for whom the police were looking. He brought 
him to the Argus headquarters, into the office of 
Anthony Anthony down by the Battery. McGinty was 
foul with dirt, as if just pulled from an ash-barrel; un¬ 
healthily fat, as if he’d just swilled on garbage. From 
his coat pocket a thin, weazened black kitten stuck its 
face, dolorously whining. McGinty truculently pulled up 
his pants, to show his independence. 

“Picked him up on Tenth Ave.” said Ike Duval. 
“Thought I might as well haul him and let Argus get the 
credit. Stand up for Mr. Anthony, McGinty!” 

“Give him a chance, Ike.” 

“I’m not afraid of ye!” said McGinty to Ike, with a 
jerk of his head. “I’m not afraid of ye!” to Anthony, 
with another jerk. He reached down one of his great 
red fists and closed it about the kitten’s neck, softly strok¬ 
ing that scrawny little black imp till it bubbled and boiled 
with purrs. 

Ye know,” said McGinty to Anthony, surveying him 
close. “Ye have a face that I have seen befar-r.” 
(“You’ve been against the law before,” grunted Ike Du- 


THE BLACK CAT 


83 


val.) “I like yer face, Mister-r Anthony. ’Tis a keen 
and fri ndly one. Ye are a man that feels deep in the 
heart. And ye have the devil-may-drink-wit’-us look about 
ye that belongs to the fighting men of Car-rk o’ Car-rk!” 

‘‘Go an and git off and away wid yer blarney!” said 
Anthony, laughing suddenly. “What are you trying to 
get from me, McGinty ? ’ ’ 

“I mane it. ’Tis no blarney. And ’tis nothing I’m 
after-r being after-r.” 

The black kitten had wriggled out of McGinty’s pocket. 
From table to chair to floor it bounded in little parabolas. 
It strutted with waving tail. In its promenade it paused 
beneath a picture of Roosevelt, staring up. It sharpened 
its claws on the floor; it arched its back; it spat, striking 
out unsheathed claws like a boxer. Roosevelt glared down. 

’Tis a good Dimmycrat!” said McGinty with pride. 
The kitten turned tail, and scampered, and leaped to a 
window ledge, still spitting. 

McGinty grew grim and serious. His bloated, red face 
wore that expression of comical intensity seen often on 
the faces of ludicrously fat people. “I have something 
I want to say to ye, Mister-r Anthony! ’ ’ 

Solemn Ike Duval moved over, standing by the door. 
“My duty to warn you that anything you say may be 
tised—” Anthony began. 

“ ’Tis not o’ me. ’Tis of auld Tim Grady. Know ye 
him? Yer men have guarded him. Listen to me, Mister-r 
Anthony Anthony! I have a word to tell ye about that 
rum-soaked auld hog!” 

Anthony’s deep brown eyes half closed. He picked at 
his cuff. 

“Hark ye! He’s kicked me from his house—I’ll tell 
the tale of it. And make of it what ye may! ’Tis known 
to no man bar-rn but me, Dinnis McGinty! ’Twas far-rty 
years ago, in Car-rk o’ Car-rk. . . . Tim cracked him wit’ 
a bottle on the head. . . . And Scotland Yar-rd itself is 
after-r being after-r him! Tim Grady is a murder! ’ ’ 


84 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Anthony opened his eyes sleepily. 

? “He’ll tr-ry to ditch his auld fri’nd, will he? He’ll 
l’ave Din McGinty to star-rve—kick me ont in the snow— 
have his doctor slam me on the nnt when I ask him for 
some money—make his l’yer sic the cops on me!” Dinnis 
was working himself into a fury against old Tim, in which 
his animosities against Spencer and Todd had equal weight. 
“No man knows of it but you and me. He’s a murder! 
—Ye hear-r me, Mister-r Anthony?” 

“What did you say, McGinty?” 

“Ay, but ye heard me! Ye heard me ! Are ye hired by 
auld Tim, too? I’ll write this to the newspapers! I’ll 
sprid it broadcast o’er the land!” 

Anthony shook his head. “Easy! Go easy, Dinnis Mc¬ 
Ginty.” 

“Where’s me black kitty?” roared McGinty, in a child¬ 
ish passion. Tears of rage started from his watery red 
eyes. “I’ll take him and go. I thought ye were me 
fri nd. Are ye tr-rying to stale me black pussy-cat from 
me, Mister-r Anthony? I’ll git auld Tim for all o’ ye! 
Where’s me cat?” 

He’s crawled out the window, ’ ’ Ike said sourly, coming 

up. 

“Ye lie!” 

“What did you say to me?” 

“I said ye lie; and lie ye do. Put not your fists on 
me; I come from Car-rk o’ Car-rk! Ye lie! He’s not 
a he—he’s a she! Give me me cat!” 

The south window was six inches ajar, and the black 
kitten had crawled through. Anthony threw the window 
open. On an icy ledge not a foot wide the kitten clung, 
whining and waving its tail. Anthony tried to reach it 
with his arm, but it was too far. 

Me black kitty!” cried McGinty, strangely tender, 
strangely maternal. “Me black Shamrock! 0,'me poor- 
little star-rving pussy-cat!” 

“Take a good look at it, brother,” said Ike Duval, 


THE BLACK CAT 


85 


i 4 It ’ll be a grease spot on the Battery in about seven 
seconds. 7 7 

“By God! 77 said Anthony, looking into the cat’s scared, 
piteous blue eyes. “I don’t like to see a living thing die 
alone! 7 7 

He did not smile, but he did not hesitate. He threw 
himself over the window ledge, his feet dangling into 
sheer space ten stories deep, and began to edge his way 
towards the cat. Sleet on the stone, slick as glass. The 
air which stirred his cropped black hair was keen and 
thin. 

“I’d not do that for living man! 7 7 whispered Solemn 
Ike, his throat dry. “Not for my brother. Watch out, 
watch out, Chief! You’re slipping! 77 

Ike leaned forth to grasp Anthony’s arm, but Anthony 
was out of reach. Far, deep below roared the street, 
with voice like Niagara’s caverns. 

Space was blue below, hazy and unreal. Cruel snow 
lay over Battery Park. Beyond the park the scummy gray 
waters of North River, where river and tide fled out to 
sea. Tug-boats whistling, sail-boats drifting, great ocean 
liners sliding forth to brave death beyond the outermost 
horizons. 

Blue and cold and clear it was. The gray surge ran 
upon the bay. ‘ * Come out, come out with us to death ! 7 7 
the passing boats saluted. 

Down in the streets hurrying noontide crowds halt. 
They gather in knots, staring up a hundred feet at the 
man alone upon the narrow icy ledge. Stolidly they wait, 
impassively hoping for catastrophe. 

“The human fly!” says Citizen A, straightening his 
feeble shoulders. “I always felt I’d like to try that my¬ 
self.”—“Bet he’s doing it for the movies,” says Citi¬ 
zen B. “It’s all a fake.”—“Ha, ha! What’s the mat¬ 
ter with you lunatics!” Citizen C jeers. “It’s only a 
dummy. 7 7 

Police Lieutenant MacErcher grasped the arm of his 


86 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


brother, editor of the Morning Mist. “It’s Anthony!” he 
shouted. “That crazy fool!” 

“What Anthony?” 

‘ ‘ That crazy fool! Runs a detective agency just to look 
for trouble. Always in it. Watch him! What’s he after? 
Out of the way! He’s falling! Run from under, you 
fools!” 

A groan of horror swelled from the crowd as the little 
man far up swayed over. Men hit and kicked to get 
out of the way, their eyes crazy with terror. 

But Anthony did not fall. He picked up the cat by its 
scruff. Carefully he edged his way back towards the win¬ 
dow, holding hard to the treacherous ledge. Ike and Mc- 
Ginty grabbed his shoulders. They pulled him back to 
safety. 

11 For a black cat! ’ ’ 

Ike Duval’s solemn face was working; his hands trem¬ 
bled. Horribly he began to swear. “That was a fool 
thing, Chief! ’ ’ 

Anthony wiped drops of snow from his face. “It has 
such pretty blue eyes, Ike.” 

“The damned blue-eyed jinx! It has a look like the 
woman Grady married.” 

Dinnis McGinty clasped the kitten in his fat arms, rock¬ 
ing it, crooning over it. “I don’t mind telling ye, Mister-r 
Anthony, ye’re a brave man. A br-rave man! Here’s the 
hand of Dinnis McGinty. Ye did it for me!” 

“I’d do the same thing for nothing,” Anthony said 
coldly. “I’m not afraid to die.” 

“I’ll take no back denial! Ye did it for me! The hand 
of Dinnis McGinty! ’Twas niver clasped by coward. 
We’re fri’nds! Remimber it, if ye ha’ need of me. ’Tis 
Dinnis McGinty who has clasped yer hand!” 

Dinnis reared back, infinitely proud. It is a lie that the 
Irish are not true. They abide by an oath. They are 
lealest of the leal. Infinitely and tragically they are sin¬ 
cere. 


THE BLACK CAT 


87 


Anthony was inclined to laugh. He was a poseur and 
afraid of posing. A solitary and egocentric man, he dis¬ 
trusted friendship, all sworn vows of faith. But the clasp 
of Dinnis was warm with earth and a quick pulse. An¬ 
thony felt himself smiling. Misanthropy is not justified. 

“Well, shall I turn this fellow over to MacErcher?” 
growled Solemn Ike. 

“That wouldn’t be friendly, would it?” Anthony asked, 
with a gesture. 


XIX. CUP OF DEATH 

T HOUGH old Tim lay upstairs in a darkened cham¬ 
ber, dismally ill, New Year’s day was not un¬ 
happy in his home. New homes, new laughter. 
New brides, new mothers-in-law. 

The indomitable spirit of always loquacious Mrs. Higgs, 
merry as a buzzard, kept things up. It was her home 
now. She was established as firmly as Gibraltar on the 
pillars of the deep. She ran things much as she had 
run the Harvey eating house in Moline, much as she ran 
all things which came beneath her claws, including her 
daughter. She swayed importantly on her hips, with a 
slow and easy motion. 

“Precious fish! My eye!” muttered Buddy Schermer- 
horn. “Will Rose be like that when she growls up?” 

Higgleson Todd, to whom Squirmy spoke, looked from 
Squirmy’s feet up full eighty inches of length, and back 
again. Todd’s square face was angry. Not less than sacri¬ 
lege to compare Rose Dawn to her mother! Slowly Todd 
turned his back, giving Squirmy view of his bald occiput, 
which was shiny as his face and much like it, only it had 
no nose. 

A dinner party was assembled with the intention (as Ma 
Higgs put it) of disgusting the turkey. Higgs was very 
simple, holding simplicity the essence of true breeding. 


88 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


In spite of all the reasons she had for pride—her daugh¬ 
ter, son-in-law, and herself—she did not believe in assum¬ 
ing airs. All these here people who purr so soft, who 
sniff, and shudder, and slide around like as if they didn’t 
have no bones—in short, the gentry—are only pretend¬ 
ing. Mrs. Higgs believed in being plain-spoken and 
natchel. 

They dined. Todd, Schermerhorn, van Chuch were 
there; van Chuch was always there with food. Dr. Spen¬ 
cer had come accompanied with his son Laurence, and his 
wife. Mrs. Spencer had a wonderfully arched nose, silver 
hair, and many glittering diamonds; even in her sleep 
she could not forget she had been a Sears, of Boston, and 
consequently wore a nightcap. Laurence Spencer was a 
big, broad young fellow, with pink skin about which women 
raved, and innocuous blue eyes. Ten years before foot¬ 
ball helmets had made him nearly baid. His left arm 
was stiff as a bough, no flexion in the elbow; that was 
memento of the glory of war. 

To complete the party—Rose and Maveen Grady; a 
Boosten Claude from Biscayne, Florida, knife-faced and 
small, but with a bush of hair big as a lion’s; a bobbed¬ 
haired girl of forty who went in for art; and the usual 
thirsty young female shifters. 

Talk paused. Higgs led all in discoursing the entrails of 
oysters. 

“Are these things poisonous, Doctor?” asked the girl 
with bobbed hair, who here (because her name is famous) 
will be known as the Arty Girl. 

“Not necessarily.” Spencer dug his fork tines into 
the squirmy animals. “Sometimes, though.” He caught 
the eye of Todd, who sat on the other side of the Arty 
Girl. “I was thinking of the case of Mrs. Mallow, Todd.” 

The Arty Girl giggled. “Mallow! What a silly name! 
Marshmallow ? ’ ’ 

“I think her first husband’s name was Marsh,” said 

n 7 u 

Spencer. 


CUP OF DEATH 


89 


“Married twice? Don’t you think marriage is silly?” 
asked the Arty Girl. 

Spencer was not to be drawn into such a sweet discus¬ 
sion. “The first husband died of drinking arsenic,” he 
puttered. 

“What a very dreadful habit!” The Arty Girl half 
swallowed her napkin. “I’ve tried perfume, but not that. 
Isn’t prohibition frightful? I know a man who never 
touched a drop before in his life, and now he’s acquired 
the most consuming thirst for Worchestershire sauce. He 
mixes it with—” 

“But I was speaking of oysters,” Spencer said loudly, 
waving an impatient hand. “Mallow, the second, died 
from eating oysters.” 

Todd tapped his fork. “I’d not say that, Spencer,” he 
advised, leaning around the Arty Girl. “You testified 
that at the trial. But it wasn’t proved.” 

Spencer pulled his sandy beard. “You handled Mrs. 
Mallow’s case excellently, Todd. The odds were all against 
you. ’ ’ 

“I will always fight for justice!” Todd said loudly. 

“An excellent defense,” Spencer insisted. “Entre nous , 
Todd, wasn’t she guilty?” 

Todd wiped his mouth. He sipped water. “She was 
acquitted. ’ ’ 

“Why was she tried if her husband ate oysters?” the 
Arty Girl demanded indignantly. “You talk about equal 
laws! You men have it so fixed that we women are simply 
your slaves if we marry you.” 

“I diagnosed rat poison with the oysters,” Spencer 
said drily. “Rat poison contains phosphorus, arsenic, 
and other indigestible things. Though my friend Todd 
thought differently. She was a good-looking woman.” 

Other conversation had died. The table listened. 

“You say she poisoned him?” Maveen Grady called 
across, fixing her glances, not on Spencer, but on Rose 
Dawn’s beautiful blue eyes. “How could she do that!” 


90 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Why, with poison.” 

Boosten Claude yapped sharply. “That woman is in 
Biscayne now.” 

“They’s plenty o’ men,” said Mrs. Higgs, “I wouldn’t 
mind poisoning.” 

“Isn’t that just too true!” cried the Arty Girl. 

Spencer looked over to where his son sat beside Maveen. 
He would have been very pleased for Laurence to de¬ 
velop interest in Maveen; not that he believed in for¬ 
tune hunting. That brought up thought of marriage. 

“Mrs. Mallow wouldn’t be such a bad match for you, 
Todd,” he said with an ironical flicker. “She was some¬ 
thing of a looker once.” 

“Thanks, Spencer. I prefer my relations with her to 
be legal.” 

“But marriage is so disgustingly legal!” chirped the 
Arty Girl. “Are you a confirmed bachelor, Mr. Todd? 
You know, I think that marriage—” 

Arty Girls of forty years don’t get much attention. 
They may know as much as pouting little seventeen- 
yearers, but it doesn’t seem plausible. 

“I mean I prefer to be her counsel,” Todd explained 
irritably. “If I ever marry, it won’t be to a woman 
twice a widow.” 

From the windows of his round spectacles Spencer looked 
at Rose Dawn, who was lightly chatting with young 
Squirmy, snaring his poor pickled heart. Already once 
a widow—Todd followed Spencer’s glance and thought. 
He broke off abruptly. 

Laurence Spencer, who was on vacation from Harvard 
Medical, talked quietly to Maveen of Harvard. “My 
brother Padriac went to Yale,” Maveen said. Young 
Spencer nodded with quiet condescension. “0, yes, a 
goodish school,” he said. 

Mrs. Higgs’s blue eyes were closing. She awoke to her 
social duties with a little grunt. “You say she used rat 


CUP OF DEATH 


91 


poison?” Higgs demanded, though the conversation had 
drifted ten minutes beyond Mrs. Mallow. 

Boosten Claude drank steadily, quietly, as becomes a 
gentleman from the South. "She’s trying to get mar¬ 
ried again. Ten men she’s after in Biscayne call them¬ 
selves the Suicide Club.” 

That brought laughter. 

They were in the salad. Squirmy, not to put too fine 
a point on it, was in a stew. He pulled his budding 
mustache, sprawled back in his chair, and surveyed 
Spencer thickly. "How’s our Harp host, Doctor?” 

Spencer did not like the tall young man. He raised his 
eyebrows. 

"Yes, Dr. Spencer; how is Mr. Grady?” asked a proper 
flapper, recalling that she should have asked before. 

"Just a little fluttering of the heart. I’ll keep him 
quiet for a while,” Spencer said. "In a month or so 
I’ll send him South.” 

"The Thorn's ready,” said Captain van Chuch. 

Talk ran on ships, wintering resorts, golf, women, the 
new books, and suchlike oddities. They were in the demi- 
tasses. 

"Did I tell you, Doctor?” asked Rose, leaning over with 
limpid eyes. "Mother had me send up some light wine for 
Tim. He is so restless. She thought it would be all right 
with you,.” 

"0, yes, perfectly all right.” But Spencer was fidget¬ 
ing nervously in his seat. Throwing down his napkin, he 
arose; and his chair toppled back. "That reminds me I 
ought to see him. I’m going to be rude and break away.” 

"Be as rude as you please,” said Mrs. Higgs graciously. 

Slowly from the dining room the physician walked, hands 
clasped behind, staring at the carpet. Once around the 
turn of the door, out of sight, he dug in his toes and hur¬ 
ried. He leaped up the stairs, pattering without dignity 
into Tim Grady’s chamber. 


92 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Don’t let him touch it!” he gasped. Then: “Sow 
much has he taken ? ’ ’ 

The night nurse, a plump girl with yellow hair and 
broad, clean forehead, arose softly, covering a letter she’d 
been writing. “What’s that, Dr. Spencer?” 

“Didn’t Mrs. Grady send up some wine, Miss MacEr- 
cher ?’ ’ 

“0, yes.” She smiled. “Of course I didn’t think of 
giving it to him without your orders, Doctor. I simply 
thanked her. ” 

“Well, that’s good! Of course you wouldn’t. Excuse 
me, Miss MacErcher.” 

Jennie MacErcher brought forth a bottle of muscatel. 
“I tasted it,” she confessed. “And it was bitter.” 

“Bitter? Like what?” 

“0, just bitter.” 

“All liquor is bitter,” said Spencer, curiously agitated. 

Jennie MacErcher looked at him understanding^, read¬ 
ing the perturbation he endeavored to hide. She drew 
her own conclusions. 

“Well, well! I’ll take it along, and analyze it. Might 
be bootlegged stuff. Might be— You understand a wife is 
apt to want to provide little delicacies for her husband,” 
Spencer explained lamely, wiping his glasses. “It is your 
place to prevent them.” 

“I think I know my duty.” 

“Of course, of course.” Spencer clapped his hands and 
turned to Tom Jefferson, who sat silently at the bed’s foot. 
“No need of your staying here, ah—Doctor—ah—” He 
could find no suitable form of address, and for the rest 
of their intercourse would address Tom as You. “I 
don’t think I ’ll need to call you into consultation ’ ’ he 
finished. 

“He likes to have someone to curse at when he wakes 
up,” growled Tom. He arose, and his great bulk filled the 
shadowy room, his eyes were dangerous with light. “It 
makes him happier.” 


CUP OF DEATH 


93 


“And he can’t curse at Miss MacErcher,” Spencer 
smiled. 

“0, can’t he!” Jennie MacErcher cried. 

“Well, it’s his way. You mustn’t mind, Miss MacEr¬ 
cher. Ten dollars a day, instead of six. That’s some¬ 
thing.” 

‘ 1 And eat alone, or with the servants ! ’ ’ 

“Do you prefer to dine with Mrs. Higgs?” 

Jennie laughed. “I wasn’t brought up with the pigs,” 
said she. 

Tim Grady groaned in his sleep. His wild eyes opened, 
staring without sight, or with sights too horrible for most 
eyes. He muttered: “ ’Tis a bloody, bloody moon! I 
feared for it!” 

“He’s always moaning that,” Jennie explained. 

“Mr. Grady’s looked on the liquor when it was red,” 
Spencer smiled. “And you won’t forget, Miss MacEr¬ 
cher ? Not a thing, except under my orders ! ’ ’ 

“What do you take me for!” Jennie cried, forgetting 
professional dignity. 

“A credit to your profession, I’m sure,” the physician 
said, patting her arm. “Of course. But keep watch!” 

Jennie MacErcher suspected dangerous things. She set 
her broad mouth. 

Dr. Spencer wrapped the bottle and put it in his over¬ 
coat pocket. But that night, after he’d driven Buddy 
Schermerhorn and the Arty Girl to their homes, he looked 
for it, and it was missing. 


XX. MURDER IN THE STARS 

P ETE LOPEZ crept through Deleon’s door like a 
shadow, stood with his back to it, listening for 
sounds beyond. ‘‘Look, Gay! ” he whispered, draw¬ 
ing Deleon over to a window. “I’m being spotted!” 
Deleon looked. Eighty feet down, on the far side of 


94 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Park Avenue, Ike Duval stood. Hands in overcoat 
pockets, unwinkingly he watched-the apartment house en¬ 
trance, as though if he but blinked his solemn eyes it 
would dry up like a bubble and blow away. 

Deleon sneered. “Not the first time you’ve been shad¬ 
owed, Pete. What are you blubbering about? No one 
thinks any more of you than I do. You’re worth ten 
thousand in cold cash bail to me.” 

“It’s a private dick from the Argus Agency. Old lady 
Schermerhorn’s sworn to get me. What’s wrong with the 
painted old fool? She got back her pearls.” 

“Tell her the stars say pearls are unlucky.” 

“She doesn’t believe in the stars any more.” 

“Does old Tim Grady still believe in the full moon?” 
Deleon asked. He sat down, picked up a pack of cards, 
and swiftly ruffled them. “You went out to Dawnrose and 
saw him?” The crisp pasteboards snapped. 

“I went out. He’s still laid up. Sleeps most all day. 
He’s raving mad because Spencer won’t let him have 
liquor. ’ ’ 

“And Rose?” 

“So far as I know, he hasn’t seen her since the wedding 
night.” 

Deleon shuffled the cards, and smiled. As by magic from 
the top of the deck he dealt four aces. 

“That’s the kind of card reading I believe in,” Pete 
admired. Deleon made an impatient gesture. “Old 
Grady had mentioned my name in his ravings, so I got in 
the house easy enough. Old Higgs hates me, and Rose— 
Well, Rose kind of looks down on me, though she was 
always soft as a kitten, and tender hearted. You see, she 
thinks I was friend to Johnny Dawn.” 

“You did me a good turn there, Pete,” Deleon admitted. 

“I didn’t have much chance to throw a bluff into old 
Grady,” Pete said. “The nurse was a superior blond 
thing who had to listen in to everything.” 

Deleon laid down his cards. “Pretty?” he asked, with 



MURDER IN THE STARS 


95 


tongue on his lips. He brushed his sleek black hair. 

“Can’t you think of anything else?” the Sieur Nuit 
asked with a smirk. ‘ ‘ She’s husky enough to crack you on 
the jaw and lay you by the ears. Old Spencer’d given 
orders Grady mustn’t be excited, and every time I opened 
my trap she put her fingers on her lips and shushed 
me. And then that ugly black ape of Grady’s was 
watching. He hates me. Ill get him yet, the growling 
nigger!” 

“You’ll get hanged yet, too.” 

“So I couldn’t get a private word in edgewise. Did 
you ever see that nigger’s arms? They’re like an ele¬ 
phant’s hooves.” 

“But you spoke to old Tim?” Deleon said impatiently. 

“Yes. Not sure if he knew who I was, or even heard 
me. He only gave signs of life when he opened his trap 
and groaned for whisky. But I fed him a little of the old 
bunk. Scared him about the full moon. Told him he was 
a fool to marry Rose. Put the fear of Hell in him. Hinted 
he’d do well by his soul to give her a divorce, with a fat 
dowry to keep her in chinchillas.” 

“You didn’t need to be so plain, Pete.” 

“I thought I might as well go the limit. Tom, this big 
smoke, must have heard me—he’s got ears like a cat’s. 
Before I knew it I was down the stairs and out the door.” 
Greasy Pete felt his brown neck. “Had a chance to palm 
a souvenir at that,” he laughed. “I picked up, from a 
table in his room—this! ’ ’ 

“Can’t keep your hands off, can you Pete?” 

In Pete’s thin, sensitive fingers shone the broad-bladed 
serpent knife. Sharply he whirled it, admiring it with 
glances fierce and ecstatic. No better hands had ever been 
fashioned for the knife, no better knife for those hands. 

“Look, Gay!” 

Lopez flicked his wrist. He cast the knife, spinning, 
tumbling, over the room. It struck against a pillow, its 
sharp point shearing silk. 


96 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Johnny Dawn used this in * Hearts Afire/ ” Pete said. 
“I stole it—” 

“You stole another thing, too, Pete, from old John 
Dawn—” 

“But I stole this. I loved it. Had to hock it. Queer 
it should have come to Grady; eh?” 

“Queer,” said Gay Deleon. He shook and cast a pair 
of dice, rattling them over the table. “Snake-eyes!” Pete 
cried with a hiss. He retrieved the serpent knife, soft as 
a lover fondling its carven hilt. 

“You’re wondering, Pete, why I wanted you to give a 
scare to old Grady.” 

Lopez’s brown face wrinkled. “Not wondering so much, 
Gay. Ma}d>e Rose Dawn with a couple of millions ali¬ 
mony would be more worth marrying than Rose Dawn 
without a cent.” 

Deleon rolled the dice again. They turned up seven. 
“I win, Pete.” 

“Not so soon, Gay! You haven’t a chance with Rose, 
rich or poor. I know her! In her heart, I’ll swear, she’s 
still dopy about John Dawn.” 

“I know her better,” Gay Deleon said softly, wisely. 

Lopez, small as a monkey, smaller than Deleon, who 
was undersize, drew up his heels on his chair, clasping his 
knees. “I’ll lay you a thousand, no.” 

“You haven’t a thousand, Pete, and I haven’t. Don’t 
be a fool!” 

“Well, I like to gamble.” 

“So do I. And I may win.” 

Deleon’s Chinaman opened to a knocking at the door. 
Ike Duval thrust in his head, fixing Pete with his solemn, 
steady eyes. Llis right overcoat pocket sagged with the 
weight of something iron. “Does Mr. Smith live here?” 
he asked for exit cue, satisfied at seeing Lopez not escaped 
him. 

“Yes, I’m Smith,” Pete jeered. “Want to see me?” 


MURDER IN THE STARS 


97 


“I mean Mr. Jones/’ Ike muttered, taken off guard. 
“Where can I find Mr. Jones?’’ 

“Lots of him in Hell,” Pete said. 

Deleon watched at the window till Ike emerged from the 
apartment house entrance and took up his stand again. 
Deleon thrust his hands in his pockets, scowling at Pete. 

“A fine stink you’ve got yourself into, Pete! And fine 
for me! Do you realize your bail has tied me up for ten 
thousand, every cent of cash I had or could raise?” 

“It’s gone. Let it go. God bless it!” Pete yawned. 

“What do you mean?” 

“I’m skipping out, Gay. Heading for happier climes. 
Vamoosing South.” 

“You mean you’re jumping bail on me?” 

“That’s the English of it, Gay. Old lawyer Wiggs him¬ 
self couldn’t get me off this time; and he’s saved me a 
thousand years up the river. They’ve got me dead, and 
old Lady Schermerhorn’s fixing to nail me. I hauled up 
the ghost of her husband in a seance once, and she’s never 
forgiven me for it. If I stick around, I’ll get twenty 
years.” 

“Listen, Pete,” said Deleon coldly, walking up and 
standing over Lopez. “This is nothing funny. We all 
know you’re witty as a fool. I tell you that ten thousand 
dollars is everything I have. My God, I can’t even stake 
my table ! ’ ’ 

“Take a chance, and run it without a bank.” 

“And find myself blown full of holes if some fellow 
makes a winning! You know what happens if I can’t 
pay.” 

“We all take a chance, Gay.” Lopez was very light¬ 
hearted. 

“ You’ve taken one too many ! Do you know I’ve had to 
put up my car for sale? I need money to pay my rent. 
Old Clay (damn him!) never paid up twenty-two hundred 
he owes, though I tweaked and cursed him till I thought 


98 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


he’d go out and rob the mails to come clean with me. His 
damned old honor !” 

“He’s good. He’ll pay some time.” 

“When Hell shows dew! I’d counted on him. You see 
what a mess your foolishness has got me in, Pete. You’ve 
tied me up, Pete. You can’t jump bail!” 

“Well, I hope I can, ’cause I’m going to.” 

“Listen to me, Pete!” Deleon tapped his finger on 
Pete’s sleeve. “Now, wait! Suppose—suppose I say you 
shall not go?” 

“Suppose you do?” 

“Suppose I say a word to him,” Deleon whispered, 
brushing his arm in the direction of the window. “Sup¬ 
pose I call in my bail and surrender you?” 

Lightly Lopez brought out a cigaret. “Suppose,” he 
said, between puffs. “Suppose I say a word” (puff) 
“about a man named Weinvoll in Milwaukee” (puff, puff) 
“or about a man” (puff, puff, puff; Pete’s brown face was 
merry) “named Dusty Hoag, of Waco, or about—” 

“Damn it! You won’t!” Deleon crashed the table. 
“You’ll hang!” 

Pete puffed like a locomotive. He squinted through the 
blue. “Gay, my friend, we’ll hang together,” he said 
gently. 

Deleon brushed his sleek black hair. His hand jammed 
in his right coat pocket. His black eyes grew narrow. 

“Pete,” he labored, “I’m speaking to you as a friend, 
and I tell you you can’t skip out! I need that ten thou¬ 
sand. It means too much right now.” 

“Your ten thousand, or my twenty years, Gay, old 
timer?” 

“I said—that you—won’t go!” 

“Stop!” 

“You heard me!” 

Pete leaped from his huddle in the chair quick as a 
rattler strikes from coil. A sharp point bit into Deleon’s 
ribs. 


MURDER IN THE STARS 


99 


“Drop that gun in your pocket, Gay! Give it here! 
Not that way, you fool! Butt first! ” Pete was still laugh¬ 
ing. “This knife, a gift from the Grady’s.” He pocketed 
Deleon’s gun. “Sharp! Feel it!” 

“It is sharp,” whispered Deleon, swallowing. 

Pete sat down again. He scratched his head. “Listen 
here, Gay. No sense in your getting excited about your 
ten thousand. I’m worth more money than that to you. 
I’ll make a strike again, and you’ll get it. Damn it, 
you 11 get it, as you always do! I ’ll toss it over the table 
on your loaded dice or your educated cards!” Pete 
smiled his dark smile. “We don’t want to break the old 
friendship for ten thousand. I helped you with Rose Dawn 
once; I can do it again!” 

“You mistook me, old Pete,” Deleon said thickly. “You 
were too quick.” 

11 Quick enough. ’ ’ 

“Now give me that knife.” 

“Some day,” said Pete, suddenly sober, “perhaps, my 
friend! ’ ’ 


XXI. PADRIAC GRADY WALKS ALONE 

W IGLEY ARSEN, always well-dressed, always an 
agreeable mixture of confidence, equality, and 
obsequity, beat his way down Broadway in the 
evening throngs. This was a night of blizzard. 

He blew snow from his brown mustache. Vaguely he 
wondered how in the name of the Demons of Frost the red¬ 
lipped women stood it, with melting snow on their deep 
bare breasts and freezing snow on their cobweb stockings. 
They were sylphs of snow, they were living icicles, garbed 
in wraithy star-strewn gowns of mist. Now night and 
snow fell about them, and they were shadows. 

Their gaudy ways were not for Wigley Arsen. He drank 
like a bounder, and he talked too much, and he was a good 


100 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


bit of a snob and rather an ass, but he was decent. And, 
remember, he was no fool. 

A taxi crawled through the misty snow. Arsen peeked 
inside (he peeked at everything) and saw Gay Deleon, 
sleeky, cheeky, fur-coated, with a woman. She was a 
bobbed-haired personage of very great name, the Arty 
Girl. She hung on Deleon’s glances as though for kisses, 
while he sat back with hands on cane, confident, too con¬ 
fident, arrogant, with an arrogance assumed to combat 
scorn. He removed his silk topper to sleek his shiny 
black hair. 

Arsen was amused. Women loved Deleon; why, women 
know. But the Arty Girl should not have permitted her¬ 
self thus to be seen abroad. She had something of a face 
to sustain, though it was not beautiful. Deleon went with 
women whose men-folks would not have named him with a 
worm. Arsen remembered when Broadway scandal had 
linked Deleon’s name with Rose Dawn, even before John 
Dawn died. 

Smashing head-on into a man, Arsen mumbled apology 
in contemptuous tone, feeling he owed it to himself, if not 
to the man he’d bumped. Silently the man bent to pick up 
his hat, which had rolled to the snow. His bared dark 
red hair, curiously rich in color, showed a broad forelock 
strand of hair white as the snow. It was a brand unmis¬ 
takable. 

“Hello, hello, Padriac Grady!” Arsen cried, scrambling 
to retrieve the hat. Haven t seen you in seven thousand 
years. Why weren’t you at your father’s wedding? My 
good friend, old Bellbender, was in top form. I wish 
they’d kept the jolly old custom of kissing the bride. Rose 
looked stunning.” 

Rose ? ’’ Padriac repeated dully. ‘‘You call her Rose ?’’ 

Without being actually much smaller, Padriac had the 
appearance of being but half his father’s bulk. Old Tim 
surged through life with a roar like storm. Men knew 
when he was coming, knew when he had passed. Padriac 


PADRIAC GRADY WALKS ALONE 


101 


went like a shadow, attracting no one’s notice. He 
might walk away down the street, and it could not be 
told just when he ceased to be visible. And he went 
alone. 

“Of course I call her Rose,” said Arsen. “Know her 
well. In love with her myself, old lad. My word on it. 
How’s it seem to have her as mother?” 

“I don’t know her,” said Padriac Grady, looking at 
the snow. 

A monosyllabic man. By his red hair Padriac may have 
been born with as much inclination to loquacity as his 
father; but it had been knocked out of him. Padriac 
Grady seemed to have forbidden himself laughter, or ex¬ 
pression of other emotion. His eyes were gravely gray; 
and so looked at life. 

“Don’t know her, Paddy! Great Lord, where’ve you 
been ? ’ ’ 

“I’ve been in Chicago,” Padriac said literally, “since 
before the wedding. And I live alone in town.” 

“But not to know your own step-mother!’’ Arsen paused. 
“Not to know Rose Dawn! Why I—I know her well!” 
he said, as though that settled something. 

“She’s been doing pictures for us ever since John Dawn 
went to war,” said Padriac, feeling explanation was due 
this strange young man who knew his family so very well. 
“I’ve seen her in pictures.” 

“Then you know she’s a damned fine looking woman!” 

“So I’ve heard.” 

“Why, any man could fall in love with her from her 
pictures! ’ ’ 

Young Grady made as though to push on. Arsen was 
conscious that Padriac, who had been a contemporary at 
college, did not know him from a jumping kangaroo. But 
that didn’t worry Arsen, he was so sure of himself. 

“Where can we go for a drink?” he demanded, grasp¬ 
ing Padriac’s arm. 

“I don’t, thanks.’’ 


102 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Arsen stuttered, thinking of old Tim. “You don’t drink 
at all?” 

Milk, ’ ’ Padriac said, without trace of humor. * 1 Coffee, 
sometimes.” 

“Well, I say,” Arsen jested, “I’ll bet you don’t even 
know my name.” 

Padriac coldly admitted ignorance. He did not know 
there were a thousand men Arsen called by first name who 
did not know Arsen’s, first or last. 

“I’m Wigley Arsen,” the journalist said, with the sim¬ 
plicity of the great. “I was three years behind you at 
New Haven.” 

“I see.” 

“But we must celebrate! I’m just on my way to see 
Anthony Anthony. You know the famous Anthony An¬ 
thony, head of the Argus Agency?” 

“I think I’ve heard of him. He’s a detective?” 

“One of my most intimate friends. A famous person. 
I know him well.” 

“I see,” Padriac said once more. Conversation lapsed. 

“You and he and I might go out for a blow,” Arsen 
volunteered, “to celebrate your father’s wedding, or your 
return from Chicago, or anything else you want to cele¬ 
brate. Tony’d be glad to meet such a famous man as your¬ 
self, Paddy,” Arsen added with a half laugh, showing 
trace of that servility, or power-worship, of which he him¬ 
self was unconscious. 

“I’m going to a movie,” Padriac stated. “I’m going 
alone!” 

Arsen was not rebuffed. “Well, cheer-io. See you at 
the club.” 

He watched young Grady drift down the street till snow 
covered his retreat. “A movie for a spree!” he thought 
with contempt. “Heir to twenty million, if it’s a dol¬ 
lar. And old Tim makes him work harder than I do for 
a living. ’ ’ That was a pleasing thought. 4 ‘ A movie ! And 
he doesn’t smoke, drink, or go with the girls! He doesn’t 


PADRIAC GRADY WALKS ALONE 


103 


know how to laugh. Wait till old Tim dies, and he comes 
into his money. He ’ll blow up ! ” 

Dot, of the street, stumped along, her imitation sable 
coat flung open from her breast. She did not even see 
Padriac Grady; she was looking for someone with money. 
But his quiet gray glances marked her out. 

Arsen scudded from the thick of the crowd into the 
entrance of the great Hotel Babylon. The Babylon had 
once been very fine, though like all fine things it was now 
decayed. It was a bit flashy, and demi-famous. The new 
Tenderloin had grown up about it. Actors frequented it, 
and actresses with gentlemen friends. 

On a tapestried lobby chair Arsen spotted old Thorn- 
wood Clay, sitting with bent shoulders. Clay did not stir; 
it seemed he had not stirred for hours. Arsen hurried 
around another way, for various mixed reasons of shame 
and snobbery not liking to greet old Clay. He needed not 
worry; Clay did not know him. 

Anthony Anthony had his rooms in the Babylon. He 
had an arrangement with the Babylon’s proprietor, Tiffany 
Bonnell, by which his men policed the hotel. 

A queer sort of place for a detective to live, Arsen 
thought, in a theatrical hotel. Yet it seems reasonable 
detectives should do all things in a queer manner. Think¬ 
ing it over, Arsen decided the Babylon was not an im¬ 
proper place, for he was conscious of a certain theatrical 
air in Anthony. 

Anthony being out, Arsen wandered about the lobby 
looking for him. Tiffany Bonnell, a small-round-fat man, 
quite as bald as though his cousin had never married a 
Sir, was talking to Ike Duval. “Hello, Ike,” said Arsen, 
breezing up and bursting in as he always breezed and burst. 
“ ’Evening, Mr. Bonnell.” 

Ike had his hands jammed in the pockets of his belted 
green overcoat. His derby was over his eyes, showing he 
was watching someone. That derby served Ike as a sand- 
hole serves the ostrich. Suspiciously he stared at old 


104 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Thornwood Clay, sitting motionless in his tapestry throne. 
Solemn Ike and Bonnell were talking Clay over. 

Ike nodded a surly greeting to Arsen, and turned back 
to the hotel manager. His glance lingered just long enough 
to say: “This man’s a crook!” 

Bonnell was more affable. Arsen’s face was unknown to 
him, but the reporter’s bearing was magnificent. He 
bowed. “Good evening, Sir.” Bonnell’s hands were be¬ 
hind his back, but his voice rubbed them; his voice 
salaamed; his voice intoned: “0, what a wonderful fel¬ 
low you are, Sir! I’m glad you are stopping at my 
hotel! ’ ’ 

“How fares my old friend, Mrs. Bonnell, Bonnell?” Ar¬ 
sen asked, pulling a handkerchief from his sleeve. 

“Very well, Sir. Thank you.” 

“And my good friend, your cousin Janice, who married 
the Baronet of Chomdeley?” 

“A little domestic trouble,” Bonnell admitted, with a 
worried air. “The English allow wife-beating, you know. 
Other than that, she’s very well.” 

“A bounder, that Chomdeley!” said Arsen, wiping his 
hands. “I’d cut him dead on the street.” Arsen had 
never seen the English Sir. “I know him well. One of 
my most intimate—enemies.” Arsen had almost slipped. 

“Neatly said, Sir,” Bonnell applauded with wan laugh¬ 
ter. “ ‘Intimate enemy!’ Ha, ha! Mine, too. You 
have perhaps visited him in England?” 

“I’d cut him dead on the street!” Arsen repeated. 
“Beating his wife! That’s no laughing matter. Why 
doesn’t she shoot him?” 

Bonnell rubbed his head. “I don’t know she ever 
thought of it,” he said. 

“And Janice was one of my dearest friends,” Arsen 
mourned. “For a whole season I was passionately fond of 
her, took her every place, danced with her once at the 
Schermerhorns. To think that beatings should bring tears 
to her bright blue eyes! ’ ’ 


PADRIAC GRADY WALKS ALONE 


105 


“Janice has brown eyes, Sir, ” Tiffany Bonnell corrected, 
smiling archly. 

“Her bright brown eyes, confound it! I’ll bet I have 
in my collar-box yet a lock of her bright brown hair.” 

“Janice’s hair is yellow,” Bonnell said a bit stiffly. He 
no longer smiled archly. “A peculiar combination—brown 
eyes and yellow hair.” 

‘ ‘ Damned peculiar! I’ve been thinking all along of 
your cousin Maudine.” 

‘ ‘ I have no cousin Maudine, Sir. ’ ’ 

“Of your wife’s cousin Maudine.” 

“My wife has no cousin,” said Bonnell, with narrow¬ 
ing glance. “Consequently she has no cousin Maudine.” 
Arsen bowed to this clearly stated logic. “I know of no 
Maudine. I never heard of the name Maudine.” 

“Well, she’s one of my most intimate friends!” Arsen 
cried in a fluster. 11 1 know her well. ’ ’ 

Bonnell turned away, his fat little stomach fluttering. 
“Who is this fellow, Ike?” he whispered audibly. 

“No guest here,” said Ike gruffly. 

Bonnell turned his back completely to Arsen, seeming 
to kick out his heels behind him. 

“Well, Ike, still watching Mr. Grady?” Arsen asked 
loudly, not wishing to beat shameful retreat. “Last time 
I saw you, you were sticking to him like a louse.” 

Ike did not care to think of himself as a louse. He heeled 
and faced Arsen squarely. “Mr. Anthony called me off 
the Grady case,” he said sharply. 

“Indeed, and why did my friend Tony do that? Of 
course you weren’t doing any good there, but my intimate 
friend Mr. Grady seemed to think—” 

“Mr. Bonnell and me are talking,” said Ike surlily. 

“Yes,” said Arsen, in shrill, hysterical tones. “Yes, I 
see.” He rose on his heels. “As my friend Mr. Bryan 
says, talking is good for the digestion—” 

Ike Duval and Mr. Bonnell marched a few steps away. 
Arsen wandered off, somewhat discomfited, and wrung the 


106 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


hand of a total stranger whom he mistook for the French 
Ambassador. The Ambassador was a dark, graceful, 
greasy sort of fellow, answering to the name of Greasy 
Pete Lopez, and at present out on bail from the calaboose. 
He returned Arsen’s salutation, looking all the time some¬ 
what inauspiciously at the Arsenic watch. 

“That fellow bears watching!” grummered Ike, flicking 
his thumb at Arsen. 

“You don’t say?” cried Bonnell, aghast. “What’s he 
done.” 

“It ain’t so much what he’s done, as what he might do,” 
said Solemn Ike ominously. “He’s never been caught yet. 
But I’d not be a bit surprised if he was implicated in that 
affair.—You know.” 

“It couldn’t be possible!” Mr. Bonnell was terrified 
to think he harbored such people in the lobby of his nice 
hotel. “You mean that affair—?” 

He waited on his toes. Ike nodded heavily, affirming the 
worst. 

“But what affair?” demanded Bonnell, after a pause. 

Solemn Ike scratched his head. “Any affair,” he ex¬ 
plained. 

Arsen’s Serbian Ambassador (Arsen had decided Pete 
came from there now) shook hands again. He slapped 
Arsen on the back, thus entering Arsen’s large, but select, 
circle of intimate friends. “Say, old timer, lend me ten 
dollars till tomorrow; will you?” he asked in the voice of 
a brother. Arsen coldly glanced at his Turkish Ambassa¬ 
dor. “I haven’t got it,” said he. So their brief brother¬ 
hood ended. 

Ike Duval and the Babylon’s manager turned their at¬ 
tention to old Thornwood Clay again. He sat silent as 
stone, staring at the floor’s carpeted flags. 

^ “He didn’t bring any baggage with him,” said Bonnell, 
“and he’s stopped tipping the waiters. I caught him to¬ 
day fumbling for the price of a newspaper at the stand. 
Signs! He’s broke.” 


PADRIAC GRADY WALKS ALONE 


107 


“Make out his bill,” Ike suggested. “If he doesn’t 
settle, I’ll give him the bum’s rush to the street.” 

‘ ‘ Thornwood Clay, of the Clays! ’ ’ Bonnell cried. “ He’s 
a gentleman!” 

“He’s broke, so he can’t be a gentleman. Remember 
first night he came here he sent a collect telegram to some 
joint in Florida? I got copies from the telegraph files. 
Clay wired—” Ike pulled tissue slips from his pocket. 
‘‘ He wired: * Thornwood. Am short of cash. Can you 
send me funds?’ And here’s the answer came back to- 
night: 1 Thornwood is away from Biscayne at pres¬ 
ent. He needs all his money. Mrs. Mallow.’ So that’s 
all.” 

“Well, well!” said Tiffany Bonnell. “That must be 
little Junior Clay.” 

“When a fellow like that,” said Ike, jerking his head, 
“says he’s short of funds, it means he’s broke harder than 
gravel. With five dollars in his pockets, your gentleman 
struts into your hotel lobby and damns you out of it, so 
almighty proud is he. Thornwood Clay is done.” 

“It doesn’t seem possible,” Bonnell mused sadly. “The 
Clays have always been gentlemen.” 

“You ain’t running an old man’s home, Mr. Bonnell.” 

“It was in a Clay home that Chomdeley met my cousin 
Janice. ... A Clay once kicked a Vanderbilt down the 
steps in ’43. ...” Bonnell mused slowly. “When the 
Prince of Wales, God bless him!” Bonnell ducked his fat 
little body, “Edward the Seventh of sainted memory, 
visited the States with Newcastle in ’60, he dined at the 
Clay mansion. And my grandfather, Ike, my own grand¬ 
father, was proud to be head butler. Proud to serve soup 
to the Clays!” 

“He’s in the soup now,” said Ike Duval, having no 
reverence for kings or Clays. “It’s his turn to be kicked 
down the steps.” 

“It’s heart-breaking,” said Bonnell, turning away his 
face. “Heart-breaking.” 


108 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


1 ‘ If Grady could kick him out, I guess I’m good enough 
to do it.” 

But when Ike Duval approached old Clay, he was afraid 
of the old man’s face of stone, afraid of the withered right 
hand which lay so steadily in his pocket. Afraid was Ike 
Duval of old Clay’s eyes, in which burned the dreadful 
dreams of him who thinks of murder! 


XXII. “HEARTS AFIRE” WITH ROSE DAWN 

P ADRIAC GRADY, walking alone, did not turn into 
one of the cinema palaces with sixty-piece orches¬ 
tras. He passed the Alhambra Palace, flaunting 
Rose Dawn in “Sin,” with eyes on the street. South on 
Broadway past Herald Square he walked alone. He found 
the place he had been seeking, a second-rate little theater, 
admissions seventeen and twenty-eight cents, children 
eleven cents. A revival was advertised of the old Dawn 
thriller, “Hearts Afire.” 

It was not a success. No one with more than seventeen 
cents to spend cared to see the Rose Dawn of eight years 
before. And John Dawn was a dead one, forgotten by 
the New York which once panted at his name. Old things 
pass (and eventually new things). In eight more years 
lovely Rose Dawn in “Sin” would be as forgot as now in 
“Hearts Afire.” 

Padriac stumbled to a seat beside a solitary man. Not 
more than two dozen spectators were in the house. The 
theater’s lessee, Augustus Bliss, stood at the back biting 
his finger nails. An evil fairy had counseled him to try a 
gamble in the movies. Better the safe thirty per cent of 
the pawn shop. 

“0 Miss Bliss!”—“Yes, Mr. Bliss!”—“I never ought to 
have took a chance in Art, Miss Bliss.”—“I think you are 
a sucker,” said Sadie Bliss.—“Ain’t I got a right to be a 
gent once in a while?” asked Gus Bliss. 


“HEARTS AFIRE” WITH ROSE DAWN 


109 


It was Anthony Anthony beside whom Padriac sat down. 
Only one glance he gave to Padriac Grady, whom he did 
not know. But that glance served him to remember young 
Grady at a later time. 

‘‘Hearts Afire” was gun-and-thunder Western stuff, in 
the good old style. Revolvers big as machine guns flashed 
in every scene. Indians charged around on truck-horses. 
The villain had black mustachios. Dead men died, and 
breathed on the ground, and raised up their heads slyly 
to see what was going on. 

Rose Dawn, not starred yet, crude and artless, but the 
loveliest of golden-curled children, played leading ingenue 
to John Dawn’s hero. A wildly laughing, acting, skipping 
creature with fleeting dimples and sudden eye-flashes. 
Nothing evident at seventeen of cold Rose Dawn, smooth 
in her perfections, the queen of art and hearts. 

Where are gone those dimples now, Rose Dawn ? Where 
are gone those sparkling eyes, richly promising true love? 
You may be artist now, Rose Dawn; and men may love your 
sculptured grace, Rose Dawn; and you may ravish the 
flat-chested clerks with the fury of your “Sin,” Rose 
Dawn; and you may be an old man’s love, beautiful Rose 
Dawn. But there are men with hearts afire for you, Rose 
Dawn, as you were in the old time, with golden curls 
down your back, joyous with artless love, your speak¬ 
ing eyes upon your hero who was your lover and your 
God! 

How the flame dies. How the flame is gone. How the 
ash is bitter. 

An old man, the ingenue’s father, with floury hair and 
penciled wrinkles, passed away. He sat up in bed, tossed 
wide his arms, and toppled backward with a flop, to show 
he had passed away. Then the villain entered with a mort¬ 
gage on the old cow ranch, and insulted Rose Dawn with an 
offer of marriage. 

“0 Mr. Bliss! That there villain’s the same gent 
pawned the Schermerhorn lady’s stolen pearls, or my name 


110 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


ain’t Sadie Blumkuss!”—“It’s Mr. Lopez himself,” Gus 
admitted gloomily. “You bet he’s a villain!” 

Debonair and dashing, brave John Dawn heroed it 
through flashing reels. He wore sombrero on black hair 
long as Buffalo Bill’s, white silk chaps, and two guns; 
he rode like a Cossack. Now he galloped in billows of dust 
straight into the midst of Greasy Pete’s Apache band; 
and snatched Rose from the burning stake; and shot ten 
men, biff-bang-boom!; and galloped away again. 

Padriac Grady showed no interest when Rose Dawn was 
not on the screen. But of her he watched each gesture, 
each laugh, each toss of curls in the wind. He leaned 
over, elbows on knees, chin on the seat in front. Thought¬ 
fully he wound and wound his white forelock. His breath 
was short and heavy. If ever we can be jealous of the 
dead, he was jealous of John Dawn’s kisses given on the 
screen through many murky fade-outs. 

“0 Mr. Bliss! What are you staring at?”—“It seems 
funny to watch a dead man on the screen that way.”—“I 
don’t see anything funny, Mr. Bliss. I wish he was deader 
than he is, Mr. Bliss.”—“He couldn’t be no deader than 
he is, Miss Bliss. They’s only twenty-three ladies and 
gents here to see him, and a Chinaman.” 

And now the squeaky piano begins tinkling music. . . . 
Slapping sombrero to pony’s sweaty flanks, John Dawn 
gallops straight for a cliff, Greasy Pete’s howling Apaches 
behind him. Up to the brink, up to the brink, and over! 
Horse and man, over the cliff’s lip, taking the hundred 
foot drop to the river! The pony drops more swiftly. In 
two spouting towers, a big one and a smaller, the river 
water rises. John Dawn emerges, swimming in dizzy cir¬ 
cles. The pony does not come up again. . . . 

Anthony’s eyes glistened. He took deep breaths, as 
does a man who smells the open wind. He struck his knees 
with clenched fists in a kind of tune. 

And now in the last fade-out John Dawn and Rose Dawn, 
those two true hearts, vanish away, kissing languorously, 


TIM GRADY’S WIFE 


111 


black curls and golden curls entwined, swearing the for- 
evers and the forevers. And the moon drops beyond the 
seas of Lower California. And that is the end of “Hearts 
Afire.” 

Dead, dead in the darkness. “Good-night!” on a col¬ 
ored plate. The piano stilled. Quick as a cat Padriac 
Grady went out, the cat which walked by himself. An¬ 
thony stopped a moment, speaking hesitatingly to Gus 
Bliss. 

“You don’t seem to be drawing very large audiences,” 
he said in low tones. “What sort of an offer would you 
consider to kill that picture?” 

“What’s the matter with that picture?” 

Anthony hesitated again. “Say, if you want, that I 
don’t like John Dawn’s face.” 

Sadie Bliss laughed shrilly. “0 Mr. Bliss!”—“Yes, 
Miss Bliss?”—“Tell the gent if he wore his hair long and 
had a mustache, his own face’d look pretty much like 
John Dawn’s face.”—“Maybe that’s the reason he don’t 
like it, Miss Bliss,” Gus grinned. “But, say, ain’t it the 
truth ? ’ ’ 


XXIII. TIM GRADY’S WIFE 


O LD Tim Grady moaning all the night. 

“Who tied me down? . . . Get up, get out, 
get away! ... 0, the curse of Cromwell! . . . 
Rose! Rose! . . . Out ye go, Thorn Clay! . . . What’s 
this on my head? Ice, ice! ’Tis winter cold. Tom! 
Tom Jifferson! Do ye hear me, black man ? . . . Am I 
dead? Who killed me? . . . Killed! Killed! 0 God, I 
didn’t mane to do it! Burke! Wake up, Burke. ’Tis 
your childer crying after-r ye. . . . Man—God! ’Tis 
blood upon his face! I didn’t mane to do it! . . . Hark! 
’Tis a bloody, bloody moon! I feared for it! . . . Ah, God 
have mercy on my soul! But ye, Rose Dawn. . . . The 


112 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


bloody moon! Pull down the shade! Tom, Tom, Tom! 
Where have ye gone ? ’ ’ 

Dreams conscious and unconscious. A crazy-quilt of 
visions. Silken rags of splendor, bits of witless gathered 
wool, bloody tatters. Old men have old bad dreams! Tim 
Grady turned and twisted hugely on his bed. An ominous 
clock drew near to midnight. 

Lights through Dawnrose were mostly darkened. Mrs. 
Higgs had gone to bed at nine. Maveen was out with 
Laurence Spencer, sowing her wild rye. Rose sat alone in 
her own chamber, before a little fire, far enough away 
from old Tim that his cries were not audible. Jennie Mac- 
Ercher straightened Tim’s coverings, but repeatedly old 
Grady tossed them off. His voice swelled and whispered 
alternately, like a rocky brook. One small light burned in 
a corner. 

Giant Tom sat at the bed foot, great arms crossed, shaven 
head on slowly heaving breast, waking to doze again, and 
breathing by starts. Long night vigils had carved in his 
cheeks, put a gray unhealthy pallor on their burnished 
black. His huge bulk, unsteadily visible in the murk, was 
awful and cloud-cloaked as any chimera of the Caves of 
Smoke. Glimpsing that terrible figure in his waking fits, 
deliriously dreaming, old Grady thought he beheld the 
devil. He slept again. His visions were kisses of the 
daughters of despair. 

In her room alone, by the hearth-fire’s whispering shad¬ 
ows, sits Rose Dawn. Late, but she does not go to bed. 
Sleep does not come well these days. And what sleep 
comes is dismal with dreams. The small fire fails. The 
long hour passes. Through a door ajar sounds Mrs. Higg’s 
snuffling breathing. 

In the hearth of winter man’s deepest verities are to be 
seen. What dreams to Rose Dawn as she watches the 
frail flame, what memories of burnt out days? It may be 
none. Her blond head is beautiful, but not necessarily 
ponderous. 


TIM GRADY’S WIFE 


113 


Dullness of midnight about. None here to pay her 
homage for her beauty’s sake, for her honor as a rich man’s 
wife. Her bearing grows a little wilted, her loveliness 
stale. Unknown to herself, perhaps Rose Dawn has grown 
to need adulation. It is a soothing morphia. 

No lie abides in the light of fire. In that hour alone 
could Rose Dawn help but see her bridegroom for himself, 
an old man, vicious, foul-hearted, wilted with hours of joy 
known long ago, miry with the earth? Is that worth ten 
million dollars? 

Rose heard her mother turn in sleep, and shuddered. 
Yet she thought she loved her mother. And knew God 
meant her to love her mother. 

If Rose repented of the bargain her mother had forced 
upon her, she said no word. Some women have repented 
who bargained no worse than she. And some have said 
no word; but some have shot with a shotgun in the night, 
and some have taken gas. 

Youth is precious, young love dear. But so is wealth. 
For Rose remained the future. Tim Grady was a rich old 
man, and he would not live long. 

Mrs. Higgs snored heavily, muttered, slapped her pil¬ 
lows, and rolled off again into wheezing dreams. Rose’s 
fingernails bitjnto her palms. 

And in old Tim’s chamber—“Is that yourself, your¬ 
self?” Tim groaned, leaning up his sick neck and survey¬ 
ing Tom. “What sor-rt of a worrisome funny-diddle is 
this, I want to know!” Tim struggled. Grim, silent, ef¬ 
ficient, dangerously strong, the black man bent over him. 
“I want my wife!” muttered old Tim Grady. “My 
wife! ’ ’ 

Spencer had predicted a month of convalescence, and 
Grady had not been ten days abed. He was strong; he was 
of the old race of giants. Writhing, threshing, kicking 
out, he threw coverings from him. Vainly Miss Mac- 
Ercher strove to quiet him. Tom kept himself sullenly 
aloof. The girl had reprimanded Tom once before for 


114 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


what she considered a familiarity. And Tom did not 
forget. 

‘‘Lie down!” Jennie cried to Tim Grady. “Behave 
yourself. You must rest a long time yet, so you will be 
well and strong. Close your eyes and go to sleep.” 

“ Sleep!” old Tim jeered, sitting up. “I’ve slept all 
night. Talk to me like a babe in ar-rms, will ye? Who 
are ye?” He was not unappreciative of her looks, for 
she was a woman. “What time is it? ’T must be nearly 
Christmas mar-rning.—Lay but your hands on me, Tom 
Jifferson, and ye’ll rue it!” 

He threw his feet over the bed’s edge, swaying a little. 
He rubbed his face, which had grown grayer, less red, 
and scratched his rumpled red-gray hair. Now he began 
to curse, with a strength and fluency he had not excelled 
in the prime and heat of youth. 

“Arrah, ye black nigger! Want to tell me what’s good 
for me, do ye? Giving me some of your iducation? I’ll 
tell ye when I m after-r wanting your advice. I know 
what’s good for Mister Grady!” 

“I’ll telephone Dr. Spencer this instant,” Jennie 
threatened, “if you don’t lie down like he’s ordered.” 

Old Tim jeered. “Where’s the whisky? I mind me 
I ve asked for it befar-r, and got some o’ your sour looks. 
Who are ye, Susie? So I’ve been sick? Ye’ll tilephone 
Spincer, you will! I pay Spincer! Fetch some whiskv 
Tom!” ’ 

Staggering, he rose, drawing a brocaded robe over his 
shoulders. “Fetch me some whisky!” he howled. “Am 
I going to wait all night ? ’ ’ 

Jennie MacErcher fluttered about him like a chicken 
about a bull. ‘ ‘ If you dare to touch a single drop of any¬ 
thing, Mr. Grady, I’ll most certainly—I’ll—telephone Dr. 
Spencer! It will kill you! ’ ’ 

The girl was nearly crying. Tim patted her cheek 
with great familiarity and pinched her chin. “Spincer, 


TIM GRADY’S WIFE 


115 


or the liquor ’ll kill me ? Whisky niver killed me yet, 
Susie. Saltpeter! Saltpeter!” He pulled a bell-cord 
madly, and fell down into a chair. “Where’s my wife?” 
he demanded again. 

Saltpeter came, buttoning himself into respectability. 
And went again; and returned with carafe and tumblers. 

Tim’s hand was shaky. Tom made no effort to help or 
hinder. Grady performed the sacerdotal rite of pouring 
liquor. He stood up to drink. The ichor of the gods 
raced in his veins. “Ah-h!” he sighed, cocking an eye. 

His face grew redder. He slapped his chest. He poured 
the rye once more. “Ah-h!” He rubbed his stomach. 
His complexion grew boiling red. His shoulders squared. 
Again. At third quaffing of that usquebaugh on which 
his infancy had been nursed, old Timothy Grady was him¬ 
self again. 

“Ay, that’s the stuff! Puts some fire in ye. Help your¬ 
self, Saltpeter, Tom Jifferson; and ye, Susie, if ye’ve a 
mind to it. Ye’ve watched o’er me like sojers,” he said. 
“I’m beginning to get recolliction. What day is ’t?” 

Tim paraded out the door, flowery as a mandarin in his 
silk robe. He tapped on his wife’s door, whispering im¬ 
patiently: “Let me in!” No answer coming, old Tim 
Grady turned the knob and entered. 

Rose was crouching by the fire, stirring it till it hissed 
with the fury of snakes. She shivered, though she was 
close to red heat. With brass tongs she traced a design 
in the glowdng coals. She had not heard Tim enter. She 
did not look up. 

Old Tim paused to gloat over her. That joy had never 
died. His breath strove. Gray and yellow shadows passed 
across Rose’s face. Her dimples were pits of black. 

You know the trick of firelight: it may enhance ugli¬ 
ness, but never beauty. Firelight is a demon painter. By 
some subtle alchemy of shadow Rose Dawn’s lovely face 
was rendered peaked and grim, face of a witch before a 


116 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


cauldron. No more than a shadow is the change from 
beauty to foulness. A dullness fell on old Tim Grady, on 
the edge of his desire. 

Rose Dawn listened, not hearing him. She thought she 
heard a whisper at her windows. And still she listened. 

A stir, a tinkle; such sound as the wind, or an owl’s pass¬ 
ing, or the shattering of ice by reason of great frost, or a 
bat’s whirring wing. Only that little single whisper in 
the confounding silence of night. But she felt cold, and 
did not look at the window. 

Again she roiled the logs with tongs. Blue flames shot 
up. Rose squatted close to the woven fender, still shiver¬ 
ing. The fire might be a semblance of a face. Her hands 
pressed her yet virginal breast. The face within the 
coals’ glow was as of one burning in everlasting fire. 

As she stood up the ugly shadows fled from her counte¬ 
nance, and it was mysteriously fair. Grady saw the tears 
upon her cheeks, and they were salt to the thirst of his 
desire. He started towards her, not able to speak. 

For an instant Rose saw him only as a dream. His 
rumpled gray hair was a halo. His brocaded robe looked 
like a carnival costume. She cowered behind the divan, 
gasping with excitement, involuntarily raising the fire- 
tongs she held. 

It’s me, Rosie. It’s Tim!” Those languorous, croon¬ 
ing notes! 

11 ^ you up 1 she asked in unsteady whispers. 

You shouldn’t be up ! What are you doing in here ! ’ ’ 

“Don’t be frightened, Rosie, colleen! Who has better 
right, Rose Dawn?” 

Rose Dawn—he used that name! Once her blue eyes 
winked. She paced back from him, curiously gaspin^ 
shuddering at sight of him, sick to her marrow. The fire- 
tongs pressed against Grady’s breast. He reached for her, 
but she eluded him, keeping the divan between them. 

“Dr. Spencer said—” Rose gasped. 

“0, the whiskered old fool!” 


TIM GRADY’S WIFE 


117 


Tim paused. He fell down on the divan and tried to 
grasp her gown. He was weaker than he thought. 
“Come, come to me, Rosie!” 

Rose could hardly speak. “Mr. Grady—Tim! Go 
away! Please! I had a dream—” (“Yes,” growled old 
Tim Grady.) “I dreamed, Tim—I dreamed—” 

“What’s all this acting, Rose? Haven’t I seen you in 
the movies?” 

“Tim, I dreamed last night John Dawn is still alive!” 

Grady dropped his hands flat. Desire was greater than 
fear, desire of the living greater than fear of the dead; 
as always will it be. “Ye’re r-raving!” he snarled. 
“Ye’re after tr-rying a trick on me! Ye and your old 
woman! What’s this for—for that gutter-snipe Deleon? 
What’s the game? Don’t tr-ry to put your play-acting 
over me, Rose Dawn!—Rose Grady!” he roared. “Rose 
Grady! That’s your name! Ye are my wife!” 

“No, no, no! Can’t you understand, Tim?” 

“I understand a lot! I wasn’t bar-rn so ’arly in the 
mar-rning!” Grady shouted the louder as fear grew 
heavier. “Don’t look so scary just to fool me, colleen! 
I don’t believe it! I’m too smar-rt for ye! He’s dead!” 
cried old Tim Grady. “John Dawn’s dead! He’s deeper 
than Dawy Jones! He’s drowned in wan water!” 

Rose was crying. “I had a dream—I saw him—” 

“Are ye tr-rying to scare me with your spooky flibber- 
tygibbets ? Am I» a babe in ar-rms to be afraid o ’ the 
dark? John Dawn, he’s fallen in the war-r!” 

“That’s what we know— But he was wild and fierce. 
And he loved me once, before— If any do come back—” 

“Do ye belave this, Rosie; or are ye tr-rying to make 
fool of Timothy Grady? Don’t fool me, girl! Ye’ll rue 
the day ye married me!” 

Ah, she was beautiful in the midnight there! In noon 
or midnight beautiful. 

“You’re mine, Rosie Grady! To put it plain, I’ve 
bought ye. None o’ your acting tricks on me!” He went 



118 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


along the divan on his knees, reaching out to take her. 
“Damned to the damned or living come between! You’re 
my wife! If Bellbender knows his letters, you’re my 
wife! By the law of God, you’re my wife!” 

“The law of God!” 

“Ay, law of man or the devil. You’re married to me. 
No ghost will come between us!” 

“Don’t—don’t—don’t, Tim! Don’t put your hands on 
me!” 

The door from the next room opened. The face of Mrs. 
Higgs, surrounded by a halo of steel curlers, and plastered 
with wrinkle-patches, poked through. She came shuffling 
through in mules. Her teeth seemed fewer than of usual. 

“Wart’s the matter?” she demanded. “Wart’s all the 
rumpus and the to-do and the rough-house? Clear out!” 
She snatched the fire-tongs from Rose’s hand. “Clear out, 
you condensible old man! You Iberian! Wart do you 
mean disturbing an honest widow-woman’s sleep in her 
own house, in her own bed, at the hour and night and 
time when all decent, law-abiding people are asleep?” 

“Shut up!” Tim yelled. “Close your tr-rap!” 

Higgs swung the fire-tongs in a circle, and Grady stum¬ 
bled back. “ I ’ll trap you! ’ ’ said she. “ I ’ll shut you up! 
I ’ll jaw you! Did we marry you to have you make a roar¬ 
ing, cussing, broiling saloon-joint out of us? Take that!” 

Tim did not take what she offered, for it was a deathly 
swing. He backed out through the door, shielding his 
face, muttering queer quips in Gaelic. 

“Do you know what I did to Higgs for cussing that-a- 
way?” Ma Higgs screeched. “I jus’ natchelly hit him a 
good swift—” 

Slam! She locked the door. 

Dr. Spencer, summoned by Miss MacErcher, came to 
Dawnrose an hour later. He found old Tim foaming up 
and down the corridors, roaring and blind and stepping on 
his own feet. “I’m all right!” Tim howled. “If ve say 
I’m not—” 


TIM GRADY’S WIFE 


119 


11 Better than you ever were in your life, Grady,’’ said 
the physician, smiling oddly behind his round glasses. 
‘‘But be careful of the liquor!” 

XXIY. THE LAW ON HANGING 

44 "'V ICTATION, Miss Dubby!” said Higgleson Todd. 

1 Lawyer Wiggs, a man with very thick lips 
1 J and wonderful receding chin, pulled the lobes 
of his long ears. Wiggs was the greatest—if not the 
greatest, the shrewdest—trial criminal lawyer in all the 
world outside Chicago. His greatest distinction in his 
wife’s eyes, much as district attorneys feared him, judges 
hated him, and juries wept for him, was that he had mar¬ 
ried a woman whose grandfather was a gentleman. 

“Yes, Sir,” Miss Dubby fluttered, poising her pencil. 

“Dictation! To Miss Mary Dubby. Dear and so forth. 
Replying to your kind regard of instant date—” 

“The address, please?” 

“The wastebasket,” said Todd softly. 

“To Miss Mary Dubby, the Wastebasket! Dear and so 
forth!” cried Miss Dubby, all distracted. “What city?” 

“New York,” Todd groaned. “State?—New York, 
Country?—America. Planet?—The earth. Constellation? 
—The solar system. Universe?—God’s.” 

‘ ‘ To Miss Mary Dubby! The Wastebasket! New York ! 
New York ! U. S. A.! The earth! Dear God! ’ ’ screeched 
poor Miss Dubby, her raveled brains flapping. 

“No! No! No! No!” wept Mr. Todd. “No! Dear 
Miss Dubby. Replying to your kind regard of instant 
date, I beg to advise that you retreat into your favorite den 
of insanity—” 

“How do you spell insanity, Mr. Todd?” fluttered Miss 
Dubby. 

“L-O-v-e. L as in women. 0 as in rye. Y as in ste¬ 
nographers. E as in fish,” explained Mr. Todd, gently 
patting her knee. 


120 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


That made Miss Dubby more excited than ever. “But 
wait a moment, Mr. Todd, please. How do you spell 
favorite?” 

“ F-a-u-v-o-r-i-t-e, ” Todd sadly intoned. 

“F-a-v-o-r-u-i-t-e, Todd,” Wiggs corrected, in sonorous 
sobbing tones. 

“Leave out the favorite! I beg to advise that you re¬ 
treat into your den of insanity—” 

“0, I’ve got all that hours ago,” Miss Dubby said con¬ 
fidently. 

“Your den of insanity, and leave Mr. Wiggs and myself 
to discuss a private matter—” 

“How do you spell Mr. Wiggs?” 

“Two Gs,” rolled Mr. Wiggs. 

“W-O-double G-S?” 

“Two Is. No, I mean one I. Two Gs. One S. No 0. 
A W.” Wiggs spoke patiently, for his stenographer also 
was of the quick-witted sex. 

“But that doesn’t make sense!” cried Miss Dubby, 
greatly good-natured at his stupidity. 

“My name doesn’t?” 

“Mr. Two-eyes. G. S. 0. A W.” read Miss Dubby tri¬ 
umphantly. “G. P. 0. means General Post Office; and 
G. 0. P. means Grand Army of the Republic; and G. 0. S. 
means Go Out Side. But G. S. 0. doesn’t mean a single, 
solitary thing! And what’s A. W.? That spells Aw!” 

“Leave out the single, solitary thing!” prayed Todd. 
“Dictation! Are you ready?” 

“I am always ready, Sir,” chirruped Miss Dubby. 

“Dictation! Dear Miss Dubby. Beat it!” 

“0, I have everything,” said Miss Dubby. She folded 
her knees. 

“All right, Sir. Next?” 

“That’s all.” 

“Yes, Sir.” Miss Dubby thrust her pencil into her 
yellow locks. Languidly she fished therein for her 
chewing gum. She yawned like a lady and scratched 


THE LAW ON HANGING 


121 


her knee. “You want me to get this out tonight?” 

“If you please.” 

Miss Dubby picked up Blackstone “On Torts,” and be¬ 
gan to read. She had always been curious to know what 
was a tort. She imagined they were something like pret¬ 
zels, only you ate them with champagne instead of beer. 

“Will you please read that over, Miss Dubby?” asked 
Todd despairingly. 

“Why, Sir, it says here: ‘If a man cuts his neighbor’s 
throat, whether or not they have existed theretofore in a 
great mutual state of harmony and concord, it shall be 
male fide done, and the heirs of the injured man shall have 
just cause to sue by the ancient law of England—’ ” 

“A sepulcher for the ancient law of England!” Todd 
yelled. “An upper on the slow local through Hell for it! 
I want you—to read—those notes!” 

“What notes?” 

“The stenographic—notes—of the letter—I just dic¬ 
tated to you!” 

“May I fetch you a glass of water, Sir?” asked Wiggs 
thunderously. 

“Yes, Sir. Why didn’t you say that at first?” Miss 
Dubby brightly fluttered the leaves of her notebook. She 
sucked the end of her pencil, and slowly mumbled. “Wait 
a minute.” She erased several lines. “Here it is.” She 
scrawled the figure of a cat devouring its own tail. She 
blew her breath on the notebook. “Are you ready?” 

“Quite ready,” whispered Todd, after several feeble 
passes. 

“Here it is. Are you ready?” Todd nodded, unable to 
speak. Miss Dubby sucked her pencil again. She rapidly 
read her notes— 

“To Mister Sarah Hubble Wastebasket. The Earth. 
Dear Universe. Replying to you in an instant, I peg—” 
(“Beg,” said Todd.) “You upset me,” said Miss Dubby. 
“Where was I?” 

“Begin again.” 


122 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Replying to you in an instant, I beg to advise that you 
repeat into your favorite— Favorite’s crossed out,” said 
Miss Dubby efficiently. “Repeat into your favorite— 
crossed out—den of love, women, rye, stenographers, fish, 
and leave Mr. Woggs, two-eyes, G. S. 0., aw, and my help 
to cuss a private batter.—Shall I sign this for you?” Miss 
Dubby asked brightly. 

Higgleson Todd clawed forth his strong right hand and 
tore her notebook away. He ripped it to pieces, and 
slammed it to the floor, and stamped on it, growling. 

“What is your religion, Miss Dubby?” (“Sir?” asked 
Miss Dubby.) “I say, where do you pray? What is your 
church ? ’ ’ 

“0, I am a free thinker.” 

< 1 1 thought it! In the name of all great free thinkers, 
of the ghost of Robert Ingersoll, listen to me! One word! ” 
Todd raised his forefinger. “Skip!” 

“Sir?” (“Skip!” Todd gasped.) “You mean to de¬ 
part?” Miss Dubby asked. 

“That’s the word! Depart! Do you understand me?” 

“Yes, Sir.” 

“All right.” 

“All right, Sir. You mean now?” 

Higgleson lifted up Blackstone “On Torts.” Miss 
Dubby’s frail blond head drifted grandly out the door. 

“You’ve got a pretty good stenographer, Todd,” said 
Wiggs. 

Higgleson Todd wiped his forehead. “She’s above the 
average,” he said, “and smart as they make ’em.” 

“A good girl,” Wiggs said, in his cavernous way. 

“Too good,” said Todd. “I wanted her to go to Mon¬ 
treal with me last week-end, and—what do you think? 
Do you know, she turned me down! ’ 9 

“She’s very foolish,” said Wiggs. “Montreal is wet.” 

“She’s been very snippy and independent since then,” 
Todd growled, souring. “A wise little kid! Damn it, 
Wiggs!” he cried sharply, gripping Wiggs’s knee. His 


THE LAW ON HANGING 


123 


arm shook. “I’ve got a passion—a passion for blonds!’’ 

Wiggs wiped his glasses. Rose Grady was a blond, he 
knew well. Wiggs put that away in his cunning old brain 
for future reference. 

“But now.” Todd tiptoed softly over and closed the 
door. 4 4 Now your business! ’ ’ 

Wiggs stroked his dubious chin. His ways were ordi¬ 
narily circumambient, and he paced like a leopard round 
about before he leaped and struck. But he dealt now with 
Todd, who could be just as dilatory, and could be just as 
direct. 

“Todd, I’m representing a fellow named Dinnis Mc- 
Ginty. Big, fat, lousy old bum. You know him. He’s 
got something on Tim Grady. He wants money.” 

“He won’t get it!” 

“No-o? Well, well! Think it over. Let Grady think 
it over. Are you up in the English law of hanging?” 

“They hang ’em for murder,” said Todd. 

“Well, w T ell! Think it over.” 

“I’ve thought it over.” 

“And your thoughts?” 

“I’ll give you five hundred to turn that bum over to the 
police. ’ ’ 

“That’s neither here nor there, Todd. Got something 
personal against him, have you? I’m not one to stand in 
the way of a fellow member of the bar,” Wiggs rolled rev¬ 
erently. “And later, of course. Later, no doubt, if you 
still want him. He tried to hold up Spencer, didn’t he?” 

“Yes, and used my name! He hasn’t got a nickle.” 

“I know it,” Wiggs admitted. “I got his last. By the 
way, it was a check of yours, drawn for the account of 
friend Grady.” 

44 What are you messing with a pauper for, Wiggs ? ’ ’ 

44 Because,” said Wiggs. 44 Because,” he said more 
loudly. He straightened up and banged his chair arms. 

44 Because!” he roared. “Because poor McGinty is an 
honest man!” 


124 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“ Put-and-take, Wiggs, ” scoffed Todd. <l Double-jointed 
peanuts. Shinny on your own side.” 

Wiggs collapsed. “Because he wants money. We want 
money. And I think we ’ll get it. ’ ’ 

“Think again. You won’t get it.” 

Wiggs slapped his knees and arose. “I believe in plain 
talking. All in good fellowship, Todd. We’ll be playing 
golf in three months. Think of it! The lush little grass, 
tender as a woman’s cheek, is already pushing forth its 
little sprouts from its little seeds beneath this blanket of 
snow. I think I can give you a handicap of three and beat 
you seven-up next spring, Todd.” 

Todd grunted. “Never saw a woman’s cheek green as 
grass. ’ ’ 

“And the lambs will gambol on the green grass,” said 
Wiggs, undisturbed. “By the way, heard the latest about 
old Thornwood Clay?” 

“No,” said Todd, tapping a pencil. “What is it?” 

“I’ve forgotten,” said Wiggs absently. “What did you 
say is the punishment for murder?” 

“They hang ’em,” said Todd. 

“That is certainly unpleasant, certainly unpleasant.” 

“And I don’t give a damn if they do!” roared Todd. 

Wiggs stroked his hat. He understood. “She’ll make a 
lovely widow,” he said. 

Todd stood up. “What’s that?” 

‘ ‘ I say Mrs. Higgs is a lovely woman. I hate the winter. 
No golf. Br-r-r! Br-r-r!” 

‘ ‘ Br-r-r! ’ ’ Todd echoed nastily. He felt like making a 
face. 

He walked up and down with his hands in his pockets 
for a long time. Something in the crafty old eyes of 
Wiggs had made him afraid. 

And Wiggs stuck his head in again, as though just out¬ 
side the door he’d been watching and waiting. “Think¬ 
ing of Grady’s will.—I suppose you’ll be having a new 
one drawn, Todd?” 


THE LAW ON HANGING 


125 


“What of it?” 

“0, ask Bellbender.” 

“What’s this? What business is it of yours?” Todd 
snarled. And was sorry of it. 


XXV. OYER THE HILLS AND AWAY 


G REASY PETE LOPEZ sat alone in the grill of 
the Hotel Babylon, watching the supper dancing. 
At the door Ike Duval was also watching him, 
as Pete was well aware. Laurence Spencer and Maveen 
Grady sat two or three tables away. 

Into the grill, dodging round and about among tables 
and dancers, his dress collar jerked awry, came running 
Gay Deleon, terrified and panting with horror of murder! 
He tried to seize self-possession when he was aware of 
eyes on him. Here he was well known, as on all Broad¬ 
way. Nonchalantly he made pretense of straightening his 
collar. He curled his dagger moustaches. Gay Deleon 
would do that on the scaffold, if a bright jade were glanc¬ 
ing at him. 

He sauntered. But he could not keep from turning 
about him uneasily, for death dogged his steps! 

The sight of Pete Lopez gave heart to him. Pete was 
bravest of the brave. Poor little Gay Deleon, so strong 
and cavemanlike with women, so wilted as a yellow can¬ 
kered rose at sight of cold blue steel! 

“Pete, Pete!” he gasped, sliding into seat across the 
table. “Anyone behind me ? See a little man with a great 
big bush of hair. Look, Pete! Don’t laugh! He ’ll have 
a gun—” 

“If I see him, I’ll tell him not to shoot; you’ll marry 
the girl,” Pete yawned. “What have you been messing 
up in now, Gay?” 

“0 damn you! Tried to run my wheel without a cent 
of bank. A damned gun-toting Southerner named Claude 


126 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


made a killing! A killing! By God, he ’ll kill me! He’s 
hot as Hell after me! Pete!” 

“I’m here. Don’t bleat my name. People are looking 
at you—women. I’ve got troubles too, Gay. Old Solemn 
Ike Duval’s going to put the irons on me tonight, I feel 
it in my blood. What got on your hip ? Look around 
easy. Play the game. You’re a gambler, better gambler 
with the cards than I.” 

“I wish I had your nerve, Pete.” 

“All right, all right. Go easy. We hang together.” 
Pete laughed again at his grim jest. “We’ll make a break 
of it; see ? Got your car ? Good. Nothing built on 
wheels can beat it. Now play the game easy. Last night 
in New York—maybe last one under Heaven. Play the 
game easy. Take a drink of this. Pete Lopez’s not fin¬ 
ished yet! ” 

Gay Deleon became heartened, became boldened. Pete 
Lopez was all carelessness and light. But that was for 
the watchful eyes of Ike Duval. In his heart the little 
Mexican was nervous; it showed in the steady liquor he 
drank, against his custom. He sat on needles. 

“See that big young fellow over there?” Pete asked. 
“And that girl in green with him? See, she’s lighting a 
cigaret now.” 

Deleon nodded, his fright forgotten at sight of a new 
face. “Not a bad looker, though I never was keen for red 
hair.” He slicked back his own hair. 

“Doc Spencer’s son; a young college smarty. But the 
girl with him is Maveen Grady, old Tim’s only daughter.” 

“Rather neat,” Deleon decided, insolently surveying 
Maveen. “Looks like a devilish hot temper. She’ll be 
worth marrying some day.” 

“Yes,” Pete said, exhaling smoke. “Old Grady’ll 
leave some rich women.” 

Deleon tapped the table. When Laurence and Maveen 
arose to dance, he followed, and after one turn of the 
floor cut in with soft apology. Laurence relinquished 


OVER THE HILLS AND AWAY 


127 


Maveen ungraciously, looking unpleasantly at Deleon. 
He did not know the gambler, but he did not like him. 

Gay whispered his stock nonsensicalities into Maveen’s 
ear. He praised her dancing, her hair, her gown. He 
swore, in such brief time as was his, a measured eternity 
of devotion. He’d spill his soul thus for any new woman. 

Maveen did not recognize him, perhaps understood she 
had never met him. But the new society, that of the 
Gradys, the Bonnells, the Wiggses, and the like, takes a 
good deal for granted; it has to. And even the old so¬ 
ciety, of the Spencers, the Schermerhorns, the Clays, and 
the like, follows suit; it has to. Maveen felt quite able to 
take care of herself, since she was a millionaire’s daugh¬ 
ter and smoked cigarets. 

And Deleon, in his black fashion, was handsome. He 
had a way with women. 

Laurence wandered about uneasily. He spoke to the 
maitre-d’hotel. “I say, Mr. Dubby, do you happen to 
know who is that chap dancing with Miss Grady?” 

Mr. Dubby, a man with frail blond hair and enormous 
domelike head, did know. “That’s Mr. Gay Deleon, Sir. 
One of the best known men on Broadway.” 

“Well, I don’t know him,” young Spencer muttered. 
“Never saw him at Cambridge in my life. Nor New Haven 
either.” That quite settled Deleon. 

Laurence wandered farther, and found Mr. Tiffany Bon- 
nell. Mr. Bonnell also knew Mr. Deleon. He had lost a 
good deal of money to Mr. Deleon, trying a roulet system 
which didn’t system. 

“Yes, Sir; he’s a professional gambler, Sir. And a 
beggar of the first water,” said the Babylon’s owner. 
“What is our society coming to? My grandfather, who 
in ’60 had dinner with the Prince of Wales, God bless him! 
Edward the Seventh of sainted memory, would not have 
permitted that fellow to pour the second wine.” 

Laurence was coldly angry. He surmised that Deleon 
did not know Maveen. Even in Boston, among the gods, 


128 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


such liberties are taken. When Deleon, slowly bobbing up 
and down in the tangled, unhappy mob, pushed Maveen 
round again, Laurence intruded. “I’m sorry!” he or¬ 
dered, his good right hand on Deleon’s shoulder. 

Deleon did not care to relinquish Maveen. He kept his 
arm about her, shaking his head. “I said I’m sorry,” 
Laurence repeated, in tones far from sorry. His fingers 
dug into Deleon’s shoulder bone, and he pulled him away 
by sheer hard force. “I’m sorry,” he stated for a third 
time, grimly smiling as Deleon stumbled away, muttering 
and threatening. 

“What was wrong?” Maveen demanded, her temper 
flaming. 

“You won’t dance with that bounder again,” Laurence 
told her. 

1 ‘ Who said I won’t ? ” Maveen was angry; no man had 
ever been born to give commands to a Grady. “I’ll dance 
with whom I please! ’ ’ 

“Not while you’re with me, Maveen,” said Laurence. 

Abruptly she left him and sought out Buddy Schermer- 
horn. She scowled as she passed by .the table where Lau¬ 
rence sat alone, to show him she was good as he. Deleon 
also danced past. He had borrowed the Arty Girl from 
young Urban Wiggs, a fat dull fool. “Yes, a most in¬ 
fernal fortune hunter!” Deleon said loudly as he got 
within Laurence’s hearing. Laurence clenched his hands. 

Maveen by now had found another cavalier, and an¬ 
other. At midnight Laurence left her and went home 
alone. 

At midnight Pete Lopez directed Deleon. “Out by that 
door. The police aren’t after you yet. Meet me at the 
west entrance with your car.” 

Ike Duval trailed Lopez, walking closer than he had 
done before. Pete’s keen desert nose scented the immi¬ 
nence of arrest. Up and down the lobbies of the Babylon 
he saw a fierce little man pacing, with grim thin lips and 
great mane of hair flying out. When the Prince Albert 


OVER THE HILLS AND AWAY 


129 


coat of Mr. Boosten Claude blew open, it gave view of a 
heavy leather gun-belt dragging at the hips. Keenly right 
and left Claude glanced, turning sharply, staring menac- 
a t a H men who looked like Deleon. Lopez could 
understand why Gay had been afraid. 

Lopez approached Claude. “There’s a fellow I’m look¬ 
ing for I’d like to get! Name o’ Deleon. Know him? 
The son-of-a-dog! ” 

“Are you looking for him too?” asked Boosten Claude. 
“Stranger, I never liked to play the hog. But I got first 
rights!” He hitched his belt. “I’ll tend to him myself! 
But if there is anything I can do for you, friend,” Claude 
added, “I’d be pleased to do it!” 

Solemn Ike Duval had his suspicious eyes on Boosten 
Claude as well as Pete Lopez now, watching for a gun to 
be passed. He sauntered up. 

“See this fellow?” Pete whispered. “He knows where 
Deleon is. He’s hiding him. But he won’t tell where.” 

“0, he’s hard, is he?” Claude cried, looking unfa¬ 
vorably at Pete and then at Ike Duval. He put his hands 
on his hips and stepped over to Ike, thrusting his fierce 
mane of hair beneath Ike’s chin; Claude was about five 
feet high. “What’ve you done with Deleon?” he de¬ 
manded of Ike. ‘ ‘ Hand him over! ’ ’ 

“Shoo, fly!” growled Ike. “Where’d you buzz from? 
You’re buzzing into trouble!” 

“I know you New York slickers!” Boosten Claude 
snapped his fingers beneath Ike’s nose. “You work in ca¬ 
hoots! Hand Deleon over, before I grow nasty!” 

Ike Duval gripped Claude’s wrists. “Friend of Greasy 
Pete’s? Huh!” His expert fingers run over Claude’s 
clothing. “Got your battery with you, I see.” He held 
the squirming grape-fruit farmer, slipping from hip-hol¬ 
sters two enormous shiny forty-fives. 

Little Boosten Claude fought and bit like a weasel. He 
threshed and wiggled, now sideways, now upside down, 
held inescapably in Ike’s strong arms. 


130 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“I’m a Southern gentleman!” he yelled, in a booming 
voice larger than himself. “Don’t you dare lay your hands 
on me!” 

“Boy, I was brought up on Southern gentlemen. I eat 
three fried every day for breakfast. Hey! Hey! Where’s 
Greasy Pete ?” 

Ike pounded through the revolving doors and out to the 
pavement. Deleon’s long blue racer, with little Pete Lo¬ 
pez like a monkey at the wheel, was roaring south down 
the left hand side of the street, daring head-on collision, 
cramming cars to the gutters, riding over shouting police¬ 
men. 

Ike Duval got to a telephone, sending warnings over 
the city. “Watch the south ferries and the Brooklyn 
bridges! Greasy Pete Lopez has broken away for the 
south! ’ ’ 

Police boxes flashing red! Whistles blowing! Motor¬ 
cycle men roaring down the avenues. Fat sergeants, two 
by two, squeezed into little tin runabouts, skipping over 
the city. Plainclothes men at the Jersey ferries. Traffic 
men at the bridges. Horse and foot, wheel and gasoline, 
eleven thousand police looking for Greasy Pete Lopez, 
who’s stolen Mrs. Schermerhorn’s pearls! 

Before the night is over one hundred and forty-two as¬ 
sorted Sicilians, Lithuanian Jews, Catalonians, Chihua- 
huans, Gypsies, Croats, and mulattoes have been hauled 
into precinct houses. Even one American, but in New 
York he is a foreigner. 

Up along the Hudson’s shore shadows flying in the night. 
A whistling wind. Cold clouds across the moon. 

Deleon and Pete drive hard in the long blue racer. 
Seventy miles an hour. The cold road flies. Lopez stares 
straight ahead of him. His quick little brown eyes seem 
dreamy, but Gay Deleon is afraid of them. 

Into Riverview with a roar. Through a flimsy barricade. 
The blue racer trembles. “Stop, stop, stop! In the name 
o’ the law!” a man is shouting. His cries are a mile be- 


OVER THE HILLS AND AWAY 


131 


hind in forty seconds. The blue racer does not even hear 
the report of the following shotgun. 

And then a red light in the midst of the road, mounted 
on a pile of stones. Lopez drives straight up, squeaking 
on the brakes when he sees he can’t go over. He throws 
gears into reverse, cursing the tribe of road-menders. 
“What are you doing?” Gay Deleon yells, seeing a man 
behind the light. 

“S-stop in yer tr-racks!” 

Pete’s eyes shine; and something shines in the right 
hand of the hulky man who cautiously approaches. “Up 
wi’ yer hands!” roars a deep brogue command. Dinnis 
McGinty tiptoes cannily towards Deleon, whose arms are 
stretched stiff. 1 ‘ Hand o ’er yer pr-retties! ’ ’ His right 
hand menaces with the weapon. “I mane business!” 

“What’s your graft?” Deleon mutters. “I’m Gay De¬ 
leon. You can’t do anything to me. I stand in with all 
the boys.” 

“No back-talk!” whooped McGinty, waggling his 
weapon. “Absolute silence is me watchwar-rd. Niver 
talk, but act! I mane business! I ain’t going to say it 
again. I mane—” 

Lopez laughed. “Put down your monkey-wrench! I 
guess we’re all in the same boat,” he said to the foolish 
McGinty. “Want to come off with us? We’re heading 
south.” 

“Why didn’t you toss a knife, and slice this wind-bag 
through the heart?” spat Deleon. 

“Might have,” said Pete. “But Anthony’s men frisked 
my knife from me. And now I think Anthony will give 
it back to Grady.” 

Half a mile up the road lay Dawnrose, somber as a 
mausoleum in the darkness of white w T ind and blue snow. 
Deleon swerved his car toward the drive entrance. “We 
might pick up a stake here,” he growled. 

“I know what you want to pick up,” said Pete wisely. 
“Shove on ! She’s not for you, you fool. Don’t be crazy. 


132 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


That, to be sure, is excellent advice. 

So north they went, the three of them, Gay, Dinnis, and 
Pete. At Tarry town they ferried over to the Jersey shore. 
Then south they went, the three of them, Lopez, McGinty, 
and Deleon. 


XXVI. LOVE HEAT 

M ISS MARY DUBBY, Higgleson Todd’s secre¬ 
tary, patted her pale hair and scratched her 
scalp with a pencil. She surveyed Padriac 
Grady, who waited in Todd’s anteroom. Todd was closeted 
with Mrs. Higgs and Rose Dawn. Miss Dubby thought 
young Grady dull as an owl. And who gives a hoot about 
an owl? 

In Todd’s inner office Todd was smiling at Rose, 
while his square fat hand strove continually to part hair 
on a head where there were not two hairs to part. His 
heavy heart was all on fire. Or perhaps it was indigestion 
which gave him that hot internal burning. 

Of course Higgs was talking. “You see if we’re leaving 
for the South, and Grady sick and dilapidated and liable 
to die, and like the first thing I told Higgs when I married 
him—• ’ ’ 

“Natural for you to want your affairs in order, Mrs. 
Higgs,” the lawyer soothed. “Mr. Grady has made no 
new will since his marriage, and as things stand, all your 
daughter would receive is her dower rights.” 

“Did we throw away our youth and beauty for some 
dar rights?” screamed Mrs. Higgs. “Did we—” 
Desperately Todd waved her short. “I’ve drawn up a 
will already to protect you, and Mr. Grady will sign it 
today! I am also going to urge on him incorporation of 
the family. It saves a lot of taxes. Anything to help 

Mrs. Grady.” Languorously his fat eyes dwelt on 
Rose. 


LOVE HEAT 


133 


She stood up. “I had no idea what Ma wanted of me,” 
she said, a trifle bitterly. “I want no claim on Tim 
Grady. I want to be free of him!” 

‘‘And you shall be free.” 

“Sit down! Sit down!” Mrs. Higgs harshly com¬ 
manded. 

“You mean annulment is possible?” Rose whispered. 

“I mean—ump— We might as well speak plainly. 
Ump! Mr. Grady won’t live forever. You’ll still be 
young.” 

“I want no thing of old Tim Grady’s!” Rose cried, 
growing hysterical. “I’m not married to him! I 
know—• ’ ’ 

“Sit down! Behave! Close your mouth!” ordered 
Higgs. “Well, I never saw the like of it! You never 
were so impydent before. What’s got in you?” 

Neither Todd nor Higgs could hold her. Sobbing throat- 
ily, her handkerchief to her mouth, Rose Dawn went out 
the door. They followed her. 

“I’ll protect your interests above all else!” Todd said 
loudly, drowning out Mrs. Higgs’s exasperated vocaliza¬ 
tions. “ I ’ll see that you — Why, hello, Mr. Grady! 
Hello, Mr. Grady! Hello, hello! I never expected to see 
you here. Hello, hello, hello!” 

For the first time Padriac saw Rose Dawn face to face. 
He was standing unsteadily, his hand on his chair-back. 
He would have liked to say gay, gallant words, but no 
words came; his throat was dry; he could not even look 
at her. Todd stuck his hands in his pockets and jangled 
keys indefinitely. The droning of Miss Dubby’s typewriter 
was a sound of flies. 

Stifling her tears, not giving him a glance, Rose passed 
out the door. 

“Well, Sir, I’d not have kept you waiting if I’d known,” 
said Todd, when Mrs. Higgs had followed her daughter 
forth. ‘ ‘ Miss Dubby, why did you make Mr. Grady wait ? ’ ’ 
Todd was excited, and he sensed excitement in Padriac. 


134* 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“I told him he could go if he wanted to,” Miss Dubby 
fluttered. 

“You did! You—You—• What was it, Sir? How can 
I serve you?” 

“I’ve forgotten,” said Padriac, staring at Todd’s waist¬ 
coat buttons. 

“Why, Sir!” cried Todd. “What are you doing to 
your glove?” 

Padriac Grady, with strong, steady fingers, had torn it 
clear across the thumb. That hushed excitement in the 
air! Todd wiped his head. 

“How’s business, Mr. Grady?” he asked. “Understand 
you’ve been West.” 

Padriac did not answer. Still his gray eyes looked 
dazed. He muttered silently. Suddenly he smashed his 
great right fist against his breast. “Business! You think 
that’s all I’m good for! By God, I’m young! I’ve got 
money ! I ’ll show you fellows! Think I’m a dumb-bell! ’ ’ 

He struck his breast again. And walked out. 

“Dictation!” roared Todd. “What’s got into young 
Grady?” 

And that night Padriac Grady went forth on Broadway, 
walking alone, but with intent not to walk alone all night. 
Came walking toward him Dot, of the street, with little 
Boosten Claude hanging to her arm. 

What had got into Padriac Grady? What furnace fires 
burned behind the iron door of his face ? He scooped Dot 
in his arms, pressed her tightly, kissed her on her painted 
lips. 

Dot slapped his face. A crowd gathered in an impass¬ 
able wall. Padriac turned to run, but he could not escape. 
He was taken with panic fury. 

The crowd stood on its mutual feet. “What’s the mat¬ 
ter?” everyone asked, turning and peering into every¬ 
one’s face; for your true crowd-man considers everyone 
else an oracle. “He ought ’o be lynched,” said everyone, 
since lynching is a way out of all difficulties. 


LOVE HEAT 


135 


Dot’s hennaed hair was dry and crackly as straws. Her 
plush coat was opened, showing much of the stuff of 
which woman is made. “Lis’n to me, Mr. Cop!” she 
shrilled. “I was walking down the street, with my ge’- 
man friend, not doing anything but minding my own busi¬ 
ness— ” 

“What is your business?” growled the officer. 

Dot looked about her for Boosten Claude, her ge’man 
friend. That gun-toting gentleman had wiggled away be¬ 
neath the crowd’s elbows, departing from Dot’s life as in¬ 
formally as he had entered it. 

* ‘ I never saw this guy before in all my life! Did I ? ” 

Some female from the crowd, evidently addressed, 
shrieked back: “Never before in all your life, Dot!” 

“You hear what m’ friend says, Mr. Cop!” cried Dot 
in triumph. 

“All right, all right! Clear out of the way wi’ you! 
You I mean, you with the fly-trap mouth!” (This to Citi¬ 
zen A.) “Girl, you come along to the station-house and 
make your complaint.” 

“I never saw him before—” 

“Tell it to the lieutenant.” 

Dot turned to more sympathetic ears. Fifty mouths 
were opened fishily. A hundred eyes gazed at her fishily. 
A hundred ears appeared to flap with a slow and fishy 
motion. 

“This guy I never saw before kissed me!” Dot stated 
angrily to a citizen. 

“What do you know about that?” cried puny Citizen 
A. “I got a notion to bust him in the jaw!” 

“And him with a mug like that!” said B, shuddering 
over all his hideous face. 

“I wish you’d crack him!” Dot said viciously. “In¬ 
sulting a lady! ’ ’ 

“You tell ’em, lady!” said A.—“Don’t let ’im get away 
with it, lady!” said B.—“Anybody can see I’m a lady,” 
said Dot. 


136 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“I don’t believe a word of it!” said C quarrelsomely. 
‘ ‘ Get off my feet, you kike ! ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ 0 Miss Bliss! ’ ’ cried the plump gentleman standing 
on C’s feet. “Was this gent talking to me, Miss Bliss?” 

“If he was talking to you he ain’t no gent,” said Sadie 
Bliss. 

Fury of fear came to Padriac Grady, ringed by those 
peering, unknown faces. He knew terror of the law. “Let 
me out of here!” He fought. He used his great fists. 
A policeman went down beneath a blow like a hammer. 
Men swarmed over him like worms over dead carrion. 
Still he fought on, standing tall above the street. “Let 
me go ! I ’ll hurt some of you! ’ ’ 

Strong, that silent young man! He had beef in him; 
he, too, was of the race of kings; he, too, could kill a man 
with a blow. He was near to murder. “I’ll hurt you!” 
He struggled hugely, seeming to grow broader, taller, to 
be as great a giant as old Tim Grady. He let loose a 
formless roar he had not known his lips contained. ‘ The 
world dipped, whirled, rocketed around him. It was a 
bedlam of mad lights and crazy sounds. They were lead¬ 
ing him to prison! 

His hands were bound so he could not move without 
pain. “So you’re a scrapper, are you?”—“Pretty tough 
fellow, are you?”—“We’ll show you, battling buck!” A 
blow upon his head. He heard the clang of a patrol 
wagon. Darkness lay on him while he was jolted over 
streets. 

Hands hauled him from the wagon at the precinct- 
house. “Want to fight some more?”—“Guess he’s got 
it most out of him.”—“Remember that face, boys! He’s 
a bad un.”—“Going to walk in nice, or d’ you want to 
be carried in on a stretcher?” 

Padriac faced the desk-lieutenant steadily. “Name’s 
John Doe,” he said. N 

Lieutenant MacErcher smiled. He knew who Padriac 
was well enough. He recalled a time he’d commented to 


LOVE HEAT 


137 


Ike Duval on Padriac’s quietness, and wondered what had 
brought this change about. MacErcher laughed, wrinkled 
with fat and much good nature. 

“John Doe, I’m glad to meet you.” 

“He butted in on my ge’man friend!” screamed Dot. 
“He kissed me. He asked me where he could find some 
excitement. I never saw him in my life before. I wasn’t 
doing nothing but minding my own business—” 

“What have you to say, Mr. Doe?” 

Padriac mouthed silently before he could speak. “Up 
and down the street I see them walking,” he whispered 
tensely. “Every man has a girl!” He grasped the rail¬ 
ing in front of him. “How do you get women? I never 
had a woman. I’ve never done a thing but work. Work 
as a boy! Work in college! Work myself to death now! 
Is it right? They think I’m a crab. They think I don’t 
feel. There’s something wild inside here! I like to live!” 

MacErcher rubbed his jowl. “You ought to be ashamed, 
a quiet, decent, respectable young fellow like you! ’ ’ His 
glance twinkled. 

In Padriac’s still gray eyes smoldered passions fierce 
and hot as those of old Tim. Only smoldered yet. But 
they’d break into flame ! 

“ It’s not right, ’ ’ he muttered, with lips scarcely moving. 
“I work like a dog. I’ve got to live! We go this way 
only once. I’ve got a right to live!” 

“Well, son, who’s stopping you?” 

“I’ve got a right to live as much as any man! I’m no 
stick of wood! I’m going to show ’em! I’m going to get 
drunk! I’m going to tear loose—•” 

Police Lieutenant MacErcher rubbed his chin for a long 
time, while Padriac’s long pent words exploded. Mac¬ 
Ercher was not in doubt for long. It would not be wise 
to bring notoriety and disgrace on a Grady. That was not 
good public policy. The newspapers played it up too 
much. It was bad example for the middle classes. 

MacErcher slapped his palms on his desk. “Charge dis- 


138 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


missed! Only before you leave, Mr.—Doe, I want to say 
a word to you about the police. It’s funny to laugh at 
them. I like the comic paper jokes myself. But remem¬ 
ber, they guard your property for you, and they guard 
your life for you. They’d have got you just the same to¬ 
night if you’d been a two-gun gangster. Remember the 
pension fund for the widows of men who died under fire, 
Mr. Grady!” 

Padriac was dazed at his freedom, at the lieutenant’s 
knowledge of his name. He stumbled forth, trying to look 
small. 

MacEreher laughed. “Feel better about him now,” he 
thought. “He’ll go the pace like a rich man’s son ought 
to. I thought there was something queer in all his quiet¬ 
ness. He might have done one of these nasty silent 
murders! ’ ’ 

XXVII. THE FACE IN THE RED DAWN 

O VER the frozen hills and the river dull bells ring 
in the seventh hour of morning. Stars tinkle 
crisp ily. 

Holy hour; moon at nadir; sun at Capricorn; earth at 
perihelion. The Hudson crackles and grumbles beneath 
its thin black ice. Frozen mists mount heavily, chained 
spirits lifting to the resurrection dawn. 

Dreadfully dolorous a wolf-dog howls. “Yow . . . 
r-r-r . . . yow!” Wolf dirge to the dead. “Yow . . . 
r-r-r . . . yow! ’ ’ Dirge to the dead, the wolf-dog howls. 

Old Tim stirred and awakened, calling to black Tom. 

‘ ‘ What’s that! ’ ’ 

“A dog, Sir. It sounds like a dog.” 

“ ’Tis a foul-mouthed dog! What’s that? I thought 
I heard sound below! ” 

Tom bent his flat, keen ears. Each sound rippling 
through the air was audible to him, but now was no sound. 
Yet the silence had become audible. 


THE FACE IN THE RED DAWN 


139 


“Some soul has passed tonight,’’ said Tom. “That’s 
why the dog’s howling. I’ve heard it often. It’s some¬ 
thing they don’t teach in colleges; but we —we know it’s 
so! My grandmammy came from the Carib isles—” 

A brave man was Tim Grady before men, in the thick 
of the fight, swinging with club or fist, roaring oaths of 
war; but a truest coward before the austere visage of the 
invisible. He sat up in bed, drawing blankets about him. 

Black Tom, rolling his fierce eyes, told stories of the 
dead. He knew them all, witch stories of the Sudanese 
White Nile, of the Carib voodoo men, of the sorcerers of 
the savannahs. He forgot he was an educated man, whis¬ 
pering lore the learned do not know. About the Woman 
with the Moon in her navel. About the Goat without 
Horns. His thick fingers wove symbols in the air. His 
guttural voice was like the witch-chant of the black 
magicians. 

“Shut up, ye nigger!” screamed Grady. “Shut up! 
Shut up! Shut up! Are ye after-r tr-rying to scare me 
like a babe in ar-rms ? Hark! Cease your moaning! ’Tis 
someone at the dar-r! ’Tis someone wanting in !” 

Again Tom listened. Again the silence. “When they 
come that way, don’t you open!” whispered Tom. The dog 
had ceased its sorrowful lament. No doubt some righteous 
boot had kicked it to its kennel or the Hell of hounds. 

“Why don’t they ring the bell?” Tim gasped. 
“Where’s Saltpeter? Who is ’t?” 

Since neither he nor Tom could be sure it was anything, 
no answer came. 

“Who is ’t? May a galloping goblin eat their mother’s 
bones! The curse o’ Cromwell on ’em! On ’em and their 
childer’s childer, on their roofs and their pigs and their 
prayers and their graves!” Thus fortified by prayer, old 
Tim climbed out of bed and into his mandarin dressing 
gown. ‘ 1 See who ’tis, Tom! ’ ’ 

Too great a coward to face the dark alone, too great a 
coward to show himself the coward before another, old 


140 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Grady shoved Tom before him. Mumbling murderous 
threats, he shuffled downstairs to the front door. Tom 
Jefferson flashed on lights before them, till stairs and all 
the rooms were yellow. 

Sharply the negro listened at the door, his barbarian 
ears flat to the glass. His straight nostrils did not seem 
to breathe. He crouched, his muscles hardened. He shook 
his head at the absence of all sound, and opened. 

The night had lighted to ghostly gray. Tim stretched 
his scaly neck out over the giant negro’s shoulder. Noth¬ 
ing happened. 

Down the walk, in the shadow of trees, Tom thought he 
heard the faint pattering of some creature hastening away. 
A sound no louder than a chipmunk’s feet. Night is al¬ 
ways replete with such tricky ghosts of sound. If Tom’s 
ears were true, they were sharper than old Tim’s, who 
heard nothing. 

Becoming emboldened, Grady roared out: “Who’s 
there?” 

No answer. The air was shivering. 

“Who’s there? Damn ye, stand far-rth and show your 
face!’ ’ 

The sky visibly lightened. It seemed the false dawn, 
yet behind thick winter fog the sun was already risen. A 
chill of impending rain or snow was in what feeble wind 
there blew. At a word from his master Tom stalked 
fiercely forth, his eyes glaring about him, his hands 
softly swinging. He went across a gray salt scum of 
snow. 

As minutes passed, old Tim also went out. He stood 
at the head of the porch steps, roaring to right and left, 
promising death to the shadows. Huddled behind the 
opened door he saw a man crouching, a gun within his 
hand. 

It was old Thornwood Clay, sitting there against the 
marble house with infinite patience. His thin white coun¬ 
tenance was dreary and sardonic. No threat he made with 


THE FACE IN THE RED DAWN 


141 


his feeble little bauble gun. No word or sign he gave to 
old Tim Grady; but waited as calmly as though he owned 
this big new mansion, as though he owned the moon and 
wind and world quite as much as Timothy Grady. For 
what he waited God, He knows. 

Old Tim, dreadfully afraid, whispered: “Is that ye, 
Thorn Clay?” Tom had turned and came back across the 
snow; Grady grew braver. “So ye didn’t get your belly¬ 
ful on Christmas Ave? What are ye back far-r? An¬ 
swer me!” 

Clay made no answer, insolent or meek. But his very 
silence was insolence insufferable. Tim made threatening 
gestures, clutched Clay’s shoulders, shook him. Ah, many 
a cup of his forbidden wine would not drown the memory 
of that insolence! 

“Stand up like a man! Don’t sneer at me! Who gave 
ye right to prowl about my own front dar-r so ’arly in 
the mar-rning?” 

The sky was light enough; it held no terrors; there 
seemed nothing to make old Tim fear. Blood rose in his 
glance. He shook that frail figure till it sagged and wilted 
in his grasp, till it was upheld only by his own two angry 
hands, till it was a bag of rags, dragging in limp folds. 
Thornwood Clay’s head fell over. And still he said no 
word. 

Now the sun came forth from cloud, but no larger than 
the littlest of moons. It was small and bitter, and red 
with a dull haze. Upon a chain of mist its crimson lamp 
swung through the east, sweeping clear of black storm 
welkin. From a pinhook of the fading morning star it 
hung its ruddy light. The gray snow was incarmined. 
The sky to the west burned back like a mirror the re¬ 
fulgence of that false red moon. 

Old Grady’s hands seemed red, but not the face of 
Clay. It was white as mist. It was cold as snow. 

‘ ‘ God ! My God! Who did this thing ? W r hy, look at 
him—he doesn’t say a war-rd!” 


142 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


XXVIII. SHIPS PUT OUT TO SEA 

< * ODY of Ragged Stranger Found Near Home of 
1—^ Movie Magnate!” 

1 3 So ran great black letters in the Morning Mist. 

“ . . . Discovered yesterday morning on the road in 
front of Dawnrose, after Mr. Grady and his family had left 
to board the Thorn, the palatial Grady yacht, for an ex¬ 
tended cruise. . . . Revolver in his hand. . . . Papers in¬ 
dicate the body may be that of Thornwood Clay. . . . 
Mr. Grady, on board the Thorn, which sails today, has 
denied himself to all interviewers. ...” 

Not Thornwood Clay’s importance justified the news, 
but Grady’s. How that must have frozen his lone soul 
upon the winds! 

Wigley Arsen had written those sentences. It was his 
epitaph on one whom in more prosperous days he had pre¬ 
sumptuously called his intimate friend. For a long time 
after writing them Wigley Arsen sat silent, to the amuse¬ 
ment of city room copy boys. He had dim vision of the 
futility of greatness, knowing all things end, even the 
pride of the Clays. 

Beneath a ruled line followed a paragraph from the 
Morning Mist “morgue,” prepared long years before for 
this grand climax in the life of Thornwood Clay. Your 
name may be there too, reader; and we some day will read! 

“Thornwood Clay, of the Massachusetts Clays, was born 
in 1851, the eldest son of Caspar Clay, once Ambassador 
to the Court of Prussia. . . . Graduating from Harvard in 
1871 . . . became associated with Fiske and Gould. . . . 
Famous market plunger, ‘Lose-a-Million Clay.’ . . . Old 
New Yorkers remember him as leader of social ten. . . . 
Famous old Clay mansion on East Twelfth visited by the 
late King Edward. ... In partnership for years with 
Timothy Grady. . . . One son survives. ...” 

Dust and grass roots and old dead bones! Thus ended 


SHIPS PUT OUT TO SEA 


143 


the honor of the very ancient Clays. More ancient yet will 
they be, but never more honorable. 

Anthony read this on a somber day. Old Clay was noth¬ 
ing to him, yet like Arsen he felt frustration. If pride 
can perish, then so can strength, courage, and cunning. 
Anthony had for years never doubted that love fails. 
Chill assailed him which did not come from the cold win¬ 
dows facing the bay. 

“So Grady’s shipping out,” remarked Lieutenant Mac- 
Ercher, watching Anthony’s troubled face. “A honey¬ 
moon trip for his bride, I suppose.” 

Ike Duval came growling in. Ike had taken bitter 
liquor, and was beset with ponderous black demons. He 
gave no greeting to Anthony. Shoving his hat on the 
back of his head, he spat at Anthony’s foot. 

“Lopez and Deleon ha’ beat it,” he said. “Blame it on 
me if you want to, but by God—” 

Anthony tossed a letter across his desk. “Why did you 
write that, Duval?” 

Gloomily, wiggling his derby on his perplexed head, Ike 
Duval read. The letter was curt, threatening, and obscene; 
and Duval’s name was signed to it. 

“What the devil makes you think I wrote that?” he 
growled, smarting under premonition of a rebuke in front 
of MacErcher. “I’ll tell anybody anything I got to say to 
his jaw. I ain’t afraid.” 

“ It’s your name, ’ ’ said Anthony grimly. 11 Suppose you 
say now what you said in the letter.” 

“I’ll say what I want to say,” said Ike, looking away, 
twisting his mouth in ferocious self-confidence. 

Lieutenant MacErcher took the letter. “Excuse me,” 
he said. “I’ll bet I know who wrote this. I’ll bet Pete 
Lopez wrote it. He’d do anything to get a man in 
trouble.” 

“He uses a pen?” asked Anthony. 

‘ ‘ Copy work, ’ ’ said MacErcher. ‘ ‘ And see that quirk in 
the A? Lopez never could make a straight A in his life. 


144 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


That little thing has kept him from becoming a high-class 

grafter. Sort of a shame. 7 ’ 

Ike was sullen, feeling he had been humiliated before 
MacErcher. “Any fool’d know I didn’t write that,” he 
said gloomily. “If I want to say anything, I say it. I d 
just as lief say it to your jaw. Ain’t that right, Mac¬ 
Ercher?” f 

MacErcher maintained diplomatic silence. Anthony s 

lips twitched. 

“And let me tell you,” said Ike more loudly, “that there 
ain’t anything Lopez would write I’d not say. Take that, 
if you want to!” 

“If I don’t want to take it?” suggested Anthony. 

“I’ll give it to you.” 

Anthony was up. MacErcher also jumped up, and Ike 
Duval walked backward slowly, doubling his fists and 
growling. 

“You’re a faker!” said Ike. “A faker!” Then he 
went speedily out the door. 

Anthony sat down again. For a long while with angry 
eyes he looked out at the stormy waters of the bay. 

“Tired of the life?” asked MacErcher. “You got the 
rover’s eye, Mr. Anthony. Often I’ve wondered why you 
stay so long.” 

Down the river, out the bay, ships floated, great and 
small. Moaning whistles crying for the sea again, dirty 
sails flapping for the sea again; old weathered planks of 
steel and oak straining for the sea again! The storm flag 
flies. The black gull dips. The north wind blows. 
The tide slides down in long and frothy waves. 
Liner and fisherboat, tug and tramp, drift off into the 
deep. 

And one proud little white steam yacht heading out. 
Her paint shines in the mist. Ensign and pennon fly. 
Smoke riffles from her stack. She shears the gurly water. 
Sirening the shore in long farewell, mincing daintily past 
the great dirty tramps, with sturdy van Chuch on deck, the 


SHIPS PUT OUT TO SEA 


145 


Thorn puts out to sea, bearing Rose Dawn, loveliest of 
women. 

Hurricane will beat upon her, death hunger at her board, 
men die, and women be in terror, before she cuts these 
waters coming from the sea again. 

She takes the deep sea to her breast. She disappears in 
gray haze. 

“You’re right,” said Anthony, “I’ve stayed too long. 
Something has seemed to hold me to this damned city. 
You know—something holds a man at times where he 
doesn’t want to be. God knows, though, where I’d go.” 

“You’ll go where the thing has gone that’d held you 
here,” said MacErcher. 

When MacErcher had left Anthony searched patiently in 
a dusty packet for a certain letter. He found it. Though 
it was signed w T ith the name of Rose Dawn, he examined 
it carefully all afternoon, looking for trace of that peculiar 
crooked A which was the signmark of Pete Lopez. 


XXIX. LIGHTS GO OUT 

D OWN past Florida keys ripples the white yacht, 
the Thorn. To tramps bearing up from the 
Caribbees she is a lovely lady, disdainful in her 
slim virgin white. To lighthouses along the hidden coast 
she is a crown of jewels as, blazing from stem to stern, she 
crawls down on the waters of the night. To those aboard, 
from old Grady to black Tom, she is roof overhead and 
floor beneath foot, safe enough and sure enough in what¬ 
ever winds there blow. 

Black sky lies breast flat on black ocean, winking and 
corruscating with huge tropic stars like tears. Dreams 
walk the deep. “When do we meet—when do we meet— 
when do we meet again, my lover?” cries the endless wind. 
In the little bijou gold-and-white saloon sat Rose, Maveen, 


146 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


and van Chuck. Tim Grady was in his cabin. Van 
Chuch was much about the women these days. 

Maveen Grady sulked. She knew herself the daughter 
of a man who had “raised himself by one suspender/’ 
and was afraid of her young step-mother’s poised, gracious 
ways. Maveen liked to do things with a bang to show her¬ 
self as good as anyone else. Reasonably, she blamed her 
unreason on her father. Furiously she smoked cigaret 
after cigaret. 

“Start the graphophone, Pete,” she ordered Captain van 
Chuch, who didn’t know whether the salutation was cor¬ 
dial or contemptuous. “O Lord, for some excitement! 
Say something, Rose! Isn’t it dead?” 

Our land is filled with such boisterous daughters of the 
recent rich. Newport, Hot Springs, the East Coast, the 
West Coast, know their loud and confident voices, know 
their dazzling garments, know their floss, their froth, their 
drivel, and their sweet seduction. That’s the worst of it. 
They screech about in scarlet cars. They wear cloth of 
gold, but little of it. They are snorty and loud, full of 
noise, liquor, and cigarets. They have the itch. It is not 
wantonness nor pride that their fair legs are always dis¬ 
played in filigreed lace, but remembrance that their mothers 
wore no stockings at all when they went out to feed the 
slops to the pigs. 

Copper bobbed locks close to golden curls, Rose and Ma¬ 
veen played with a ouija board. For three or four min¬ 
utes, dragging like ages, they asked silent questions of the 
Dark. Lights in the saloon were none too bright. Mys¬ 
teriously, nothing happened. 

“I know these things can work!” Maveen said viciously. 
“I’ll make it work.” 

Peter van Chuch, gold-braided, sleek, and a little fat, 
was uneasy with the nearness of these two young women, 
either of whom considered herself as far above him as the 
cold north star, growing farther the more directly the mari¬ 
ner steers to it. And he had not forgiven Maveen for once 


LIGHTS GO OUT 


147 


calling him a fool. Now he was on his own ship, and he 
was master here. The ocean makes brave hearts, even in 
van Chuchs. It abides no rabbit feet pacing its valiant 
ships! 

“The spirits may be on strike,” van Chnch joked heavily. 
“Or maybe they belong to the class of undeserving poor 
who can’t go South for the winter.” 

Baal’s proud priests thus once mocked the prophet sac- 
rificant. Were the Almighty what it was of eld, undoubt¬ 
edly van Chuch would have been struck down immediately 
with battle-ax of lightning. But his only doom was a kind 
smile from Rose, who pitied him, and a toss of the head 
from Maveen. 

Muttering loudly, old Tim reeled into the saloon, the 
heaviness of anger and usquebaugh on him. He was thin¬ 
ner than he had been, but large and powerful for all his 
deliriums. He flipped a letter beneath Rose’s eyes, roaring 
loud enough to awaken sleeping Mrs. Higgs, if not the dead. 

“What’s this letter about Gay Deleon doing in your 
desk! ’ ’ 

Rose Dawn stood up, sick and frightened. Van Chuch 
stepped away on his short legs, bumbling like a bee some 
apology. But Maveen came to the attack against her 
father. His anger against anyone never failed to rouse 
Maveen to a furious defense. Rose was incapable of 
speech, of fighting Tim’s fierce anger in his own way. 

“What business have you reading someone else’s let¬ 
ters?” Maveen asked. 

“What business have you as-sking me what business I 
have?” Tim shrieked at his daughter, forgetting his anger 
against Rose. 

Maveen snatched the letter. “Here, Rose—your prop¬ 
erty ! ’ ’ 

“Well, what— Well, what!” Tim howled. “I’ll strap 
ye well, ye impudent girl! I ’ll slap your face! I ’ll learn 
ye manners ! ’ ’ 

Rose Dawn found her tongue. “This is the last letter 


148 ONCE IN A RED MOON 

John Dawn wrote to me,” she whispered. “Do you object 
if I keep it?” 

Clumsily old Tim bent over her. He had had two wives 
before; he was afraid of tears. Passion came on him. He 
pressed his lips to her neck. Rose shivered; her shoulders 
lifted. Young flesh and old moist lips ! The one will burn, 
the other rot. 

In decent fashion van Chuch had turned his back, star¬ 
ing at the gold and white wall-panels. His square Dutch 
jaws gritted. Mirrors were set between the panels; in one 
he watched Rose. Seafaring men, it’s said, have an eye 
for women. Van Chuch’s fists tightened. Now the Thorn 
fell in the trough of a roller. Van Chuch teetered and 
sprawled unseamanly. 

“There, there,” old Tim said gruffly, feeling her shrink, 
and a little ashamed in his own lecherous heart. He picked 
up the ouija board. “What’s this? Fit for fools and 
idiots! I’ll make the damned thing jiggle!” (To Ma- 
veen) “Come on! Sit down! I’ll show ye how.” 

“You’ll have to keep still,” Maveen told him. 

“Keep still! Who’s shooting off their mouth? I can 
keep still.” 

“Then keep still for only five minutes.” 

“ I ’ll keep still for five hundred minutes! I ’ll keep still 
far-rever! Keep still yourself! ’ ’ 

“Can you keep still?” 

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” Tim barked. “I can keep still as 
long as I got the notion for it. I’ve got self-control. 
Shut your mouth! Keep still! ’ ’ 

“Then if you can, keep still!” 

“I’m doing it! ’Tis ye not keeping still! Keep still!’’ 

So they sat and barked commands, their hands on the 
triangular planchette, ferociously glaring at each other. 
The ouija board was much more calm than they. That con¬ 
venient wooden oracle, whereby spirits of the disembodied 
damned are summoned from their great thrones in the 
outermost Hells, maintained miraculous silence. 


LIGHTS GO OUT 


149 


Old Tim assumed scornful levity, but that passed after 
minutes of silence. The board throbbed, for the whole ship 
throbbed with engine pulsings. The saloon’s shadowy 
lights worked heavily on Tim’s spirit as they shifted like 
gray ghosts in the corners. The Thorn’s monotonous surg¬ 
ing was as solemn music. 

Maveen had closed her green eyes, shivering. “Have 
you asked your question yet? Think it; don’t say it.” 

“Ah, ye spoke fir-rst!” Tim crowed. 

“Well, keep still now!” 

“Who’s opening up their jaw?” 

“For God’s sake!” cried Maveen, half crazy. “Will 
you shut up! Something’s trying to move this board!” 

In old Tim were deeps of faith unplumbed, the eternal 
credulity of the Celt. It may be faith transcending truth. 
The Celt does mighty things, wields powers not known to 
reason. He harks to unseen voices. 

The souls of the darkness and the silence gripped the 
soul of old Tim Grady. Maveen opened startled eyes as 
the board trembled and slipped three inches. Old Tim 
Grady stared; his face was moist as a dewy rose. The 
helm of the Thorn had taken a slight turn. Only the 
weight of mountainous waters clutching at her keel caused 
that board to tremble. Nothing more. 

The fear gripped old Tim Grady. His lips moved in 
silent question, mute and afraid. Tim Grady asked ques¬ 
tion of the Dark. On the sea, in the dark of middle night, 
old Tim Grady addressed to the invisible world that in¬ 
terrogation whose answer lies closest to all men’s hearts, 
how great their faith or small. 

“How long am I going to live? Answer me that!” 

Answer him that, vast Dark! 

From out the restless Atlantic rollicked up a wave, 
smiting a buffet on the Thorn’s ribs. The board stirred; 
no doubt of it! With popping eyes Tim read. 

“C! ’Tis a C, Maveen! 0!—N!—S!—What is’t? 
What is’t?” 


150 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Keep still, for Heaven’s sake!” 

“I’m keeping still. Girl, look at it! Look at it!” 

C-o-n-s-t-a-b-l-e B-u-r-k-e t-o G-r-a-d-y— 

“God! God!” 

“Keep still!” 

G-r-e-e-t-i-n-g-s f-r-o-m t-h-e D-a-m-n-e^d, Y-o-u-n-g 
G-r-a-d-y— 

Tim’s face was gray. Maveen spelled out the letters, 
sharply excited. The old man’s heavy fingers shook, and 
he gulped wind. “ ’Tis a lie!” he muttered with palsied 
tongue. “ ’Tis a tr-rick! I don’t belave it!” 

The board faltered, as though giant spirits wrestled for 
it, as though in that chaos which knows not space nor 
bounds king devils uprooted sod of stars in furious battle 
for it! 

T-h-o-r-n-w-o-o-d C-l-a-y T-o O-l-d T-i-m G-r-a-d-y— 

Tim’s fierce red glances were nests of venomous spiders. 
He wallowed in oaths, indifferent alike to the ladylike liv¬ 
ing and the gentlemanly dead. A horror of silence lay on 
the little gold-and-white saloon. 

C -O-L-D H-E-R-E—R-E-M-E-M-B-E-R— A B-L-O-O-D-Y 

M-o-o-n, I F-e-a-r f-o-r i-t—D-i-e, D-i-e, T-i-m G-r-a-d-y, 
W-H-E-N B-L-O-O-D I-S O-N T-H-E M-O-O-N— 

The quivering board hesitated at the last N. Strength 
went from the wood as old Tim’s arms crashed at his sides. 
From foolish X to Q the pointer rambled on spindly legs. 
No more sense was in it than in the dead. Its message 
dwindled off to ravelings and wool. 

Thus for the warning. Say that truth spoke from the 
wood. Or say old Tim’s delirious fears sent himself that 
message. No law forbids either belief. 

Grady strangled to breathe, as though ghostly hands had 
him already by the windpipe. He threw back his head. 
He ripped forth oaths. He cursed God, and he cursed 
Satan by the name of God. He cursed himself, and all 
souls living. Cursed Burke and Clay, and all souls dead. 


LIGHTS GO OUT 


151 


He cursed God by the name of God! And then he spoke of 
Cromwell. 

Smash! he brought down his fist. From crescent moon 
to star the board split wide. Yes and No were broken 
clean, like the answers of the doubtful Delphic oracle. The 
split board seemed to grin. 

Tim's rust-shot eyes were wild and rolling, but his voice 
showed small diminution of its accustomed strength. It 
was harsh and furious. With his roars he would have 
filled up the wastes of the void, though likely in the void 
they sounded thin and small. 

“That for the damned thing! ’Tis a tr-rick in it! I 
don’t belave—I don’t belave it! Could a soul come sail¬ 
ing back from— 0, Cromwell’s curses—” 

The Thorn listed heavily in the valley of a ground swell. 
Here for an instant sight of Rose Dawn sitting silently, 
van Chuch weaving his hands, Maveen nervously lighting 
a cigaret, old Tim lifting his fists and shouting. Then the 
dark, swallowing all. Over the Thorn the dark. Red and 
green and dazzling white, running, masthead, starboard, 
larboard, bow and quarter, through all her sparkling 
length her lights went sharply out. 

Confused shouts came from deck. Running naked feet 
pattered. Past the windows drifted wan shapes of sailor- 
men. “Put her sharp around, helmsman!” van Chuch 
roared out the window. 

“Sharp to port!”—“Ay, ay!”—“Hard over with ’er, 
Red! Hundred and eighty, set your course!”—“Haul on 
this here wheel, Tom. Beef in it, smoke! Down!”— 
“Who set us straight on the keys?” van Chuch boomed.— 
“Not I, Sir. All clear ahead.” 

Old Tim Grady howled, precipitated into that sudden 
dreadful dark. He fought with blind fists at chimeras in¬ 
visible. The blackness of the air had serpent coils; the 
night’s breath panted. Treacherous the arms and breath 
of the night! The night sucked old Grady’s soul from 


152 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


out his lips like demon woman with love on fire. 

Loudly a table overset, bearing down an avalanche of 
porcelain. Something was rolling, pitching on the floor, 
creeping under Tim’s feet, snatching at his ankles. Old 
Tim panted as he swung his fist in front of him. It struck 
against something hard. A sharp thing, tooth, or knife, 
or pin, bit in his arm. 

Muffled, harsh-breathed oaths. ... A faint, deep 
cry. . . . Dim sailormen rushing down the deck. . . . Con¬ 
tinually the ocean, solemn and dolorous, its brass drums 
beating on far shores. . . . 

Piercing above all for one sharp note was a cry of hys¬ 
teria, the sound of mirthless laughter. The laughter rose. 
It became a scream, and passed out to silence on a high 
note, superaudibly vibrant. 

“Whisky, Tom!” Tim Grady was croaking. “God— 
your hands! Get off my throat! Help ! Rose! Rosie ! ’ 7 

Sounds of ripping, staggering wrestling. From afar did 
Tim Grady hear the muttering of van Chuch, the growling 
of Tom Jefferson, as he strangled in the blackness of the 
night ? 

1 ‘ Fetch—light! I got it! ” 

Ay, he had got it. 


XXX. THE QUEEN OF SPADES 

I T happened that on a night there gathered in the Royal 
Poinsettia hotel, Biscayne, Florida, five men. They 
were gathered with the purpose of combining and 
conspiring in the commission of a crime against the laws of 
the sovereign State of Florida and the Methodist Church, 
viz., to play poker. 

Three of the men had more money that they would 
spend, and the other two had never earned a dollar in all 
their parasitical lives. But here they were, in one of the 
most perfect tropic nights which ever lay on shore and bar 


THE QUEEN OF SPADES 


153 


and ocean, trying to capture pasteboard cards with certain 
markings on them, and so take each other’s money. 

Of those five men, one was young Laurence Spencer, 
sent to Biscayne by his genial physical father in order to 
greet the Grady yacht when it arrived, and with the 
delusion that Laurence’s interest in Maveen Grady might 
develop into something more fruitful than an occasional 
infecund embrace during dancing. Not, to be sure, that 
Dr. Russel Spencer believed in fortune hunting; but he did 
believe that any young lady desirous of attaining to the le¬ 
gitimate marital love of Laurence, scion of the Spencers 
and the Bostonese Searses, should be willing to pay for it. 

A second man was Boosten Claude, the fighting little 
grapefruit farmer who had run foul of Deleon in New 
York. Returned now to his native grapefruitage, he had 
abandoned his determination to shoot Gay Deleon. Across 
the table from Deleon he sat, his long, stiff bristles of hair 
rising in an angry tower, his narrowed eyes looking hotly 
at Deleon. 

The other two men were Thornwood Clay, son of that old 
man who died at Dawnrose’s doors, and Colonel Stoughton 
Dawn, father of John Dawn. The last of the Clays was a 
smooth-faced man, well barbered and massaged, with gray 
mustache and hair. Though his cheeks held blood, they 
too seemed gray—a man of mist, a shadowy man, a locust- 
shell of dead delights and a husk of gentility. 

Old Stoughton Dawn was an old man, withered and 
parched with heat. His hair was of the whitest white, blue 
white, a tinge of whiteness more intense than the rainbow 
whiteness of snow or the gray whiteness of milk. Yet his 
brows were astonishingly heavy and black, shielding black 
eyes of a quite youthful fierceness. 

Deleon threw down cards, and with clutching, snapping 
fingers tore the whole pack to bits and flung it to the floor. 
“Lousy, bastard luck!” he gasped, using adjectives oftener 
heard than seen. 

Two of those four men who played with him were deathly 


154 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


inimical. Boosten Claude hated him for his own sake, and 
Thornwood Clay for his father’s. It may be that they had 
previously agreed to break Deleon, playing the game to¬ 
gether against him. The younger Clay held little respect 
for the honor of the Clays; he had lived his life for cards 
and women, and they were more to him than a hypotheti¬ 
cal question of fair play. And Boosten Claude, like some 
others of the rich new gentry of Florida, came from the 
lowest Georgia cracker stock, and held anything honest 
which did not land him in jail. 

Beyond half-shaded windows a filling moon ripe as an 
orange swam up from the ocean, sailing over tall palms. 
A week, and it would reach its round red full. It tinted 
the waters of Bay Mimayne, tinted the bowl of ink which 
was the sky. Faint green phosphorescence shone on bay 
and ocean, separated each from each by the narrow tongue 
of Key Mimayne. But no light shone in Black River, 
flowing past the hotel from marshlands down to the bay. 

Night grew later. Deleon tried to summon up an 
assured defiance of damnation, the gambler’s boast and con¬ 
fidence. But his hands trembled, and his eyes were dull. 

“I’ve won your car, Deleon,” barked Boosten Claude. 
“Now do you want to play your pants?” 

Clay passed chips to Deleon. “Last of my father’s 
debt,” he said. “The Clays pay, dollar for dollar!” 

The knob of the unlocked door rattled. Boosten Claude 
threw a newspaper over the gaming table. Colonel Dawn 
picked up a hotel Bible, assiduously reading that Enoch 
begat Gog. Silently the five men sat, pleasantly aware 
that they were criminals, and that the laws of all nations 
were set against them. 

A woman of middle-age thrust her face in, prettily pout¬ 
ing, smiling with small, hard eyes. When young she had 
been told those simperings were ingenuous, but in her full 
ripe years they gave her the appearance of a surprised cow. 
She was inconspicuously clad in negligee. 

Mrs. Mallow, old Dawn whispered to Laurence. 


THE QUEEN OF SPADES 


155 


“You’ll have to be initiated into the Suicide Club now. 
Claude is president.” 

“ ’Xcuse me,” said the famous Mrs. Mallow. “Didn’t 
expect to find anyone else with you, Thorn. How do, 
Colonel. And Mr. Claude!” 

Bobbling forward, with a swaying, knee-dragging motion, 
she extended her fingers. She was especially pleased with 
Laurence’s looks, who, in spite of his bald head, looked 
pink and young; and at him she directed sly, amorous 
glances. 

“Are you wicked, wicked men playing poker?” she 
asked. ‘ ‘ Ten dollars for this little chip ! ’ ’ She squealed. 
Deleon snatched from her hand the chip she had taken up. 

“Aren’t you afraid of the police?” she roguishly asked 
old Dawn, who was chief of police in Biscayne. 

Then she pranced around the table, stepping like a high- 
school horse. 11 Can’t I give somebody luck ? ’ ’ she screamed 
in high tones. “Won’t somebody let me give him luck? I 
want to give somebody luck!” 

Deleon had planted his elbows on his chair arms, frus¬ 
trating Mrs. Mallow’s attempts to perch there. No perch 
was available on which such a plump last spring’s chicken 
might roost. She drew up a chair between Clay and 
Deleon, tripling the folds of her chin as she rested it on 
her knuckles. 

Deleon surveyed her cunningly, with that thirsty inso¬ 
lence of look best known in hotel lobbies. His eyes had 
acquired a certain brightness. He breathed more quickly. 
He sleeked back his shiny hair. A smile caused his mus¬ 
tache to ripple. Lucky at love—! 

The game was breaking up. All men but Deleon had 
risen, receiving money from old Dawn in exchange for 
chips. Mrs. Mallow saw her group of admirers disinte¬ 
grating. 

“Have you heard that rich Mr. Tim Grady is coming to 
Biscayne?” she asked. “I want you to introduce me, Mr. 
Claude.” 


156 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“0, we’ll initiate him into the Suicide Club, said 
Boosten Claude. 

“What club is that?” asked Mallow. “What a dread¬ 
ful name !” l . 

“It’s named for the queen of spades,” said Claude maa- 
ciously. ‘ ‘ A club for the queen of spades, the lowest card 
in the deck.” 

“Tim Grady,” Deleon repeated, looking cunningly down¬ 
ward. 

“Married a show girl,” said old Dawn. . ^ 

Deleon sat up, kicking the table leg. '‘A show girl!” 
he said contemptuously. “He married Rose Dawn, that s 
whom he married! ’ ’ He looked up at old Stoughton 
Dawn, and for the first time the significance of the old 
man’s name came to him. “Were you related to John 
Dawn?” 

“I was his father.” 

“Then you know Rose?” 

Old Dawn shook his head. “I never met her,” he said. 

“I knew Dawn,” said Deleon, frowning, thinking un¬ 
easy thoughts. 

“Two hundred years the Dawns ’ve lived here,” said the 
old Colonel. “Came with the Spanish. We used to be 
Dons. Two hundred years! But he was wild, and ran 
away. Married a foreign woman out in California.” 

Deleon was smiling at Mrs. Mallow. She interested him, 
for she had been a beauty, and she was yet a woman. 
Though the affairs of that woman with the late Marsh and 
Mallow were ten years old, Gay Deleon knew all affairs of 
the devil for the past ten thousand years, which is as long 
as women have used paint. 

Out the door they had gone, Colonel Dawn, and Boosten 
Claude, and Deleon. Mrs. Mallow took the uneasy arm of 
Laurence Spencer before he could withdraw. As Clay 
opened the door for them, switching off the lights, Mrs. 
Mallow turned back toward the darkness and Laurence 
with a hushed giggle. 

% 


THE QUEEN OF SPADES 157 

“Do you dare to kiss me?” she asked, putting up her 
face. 

Laurence stammered. Her moist lips were on his, like 
the touch of a sponge. When he could, Laurence furtively 
wiped his lips. Thornwood Clay stood by with a weary 
smile, saying nothing, and possibly thinking nothing. 

In the darkened room a slim sliver of reflected moon¬ 
light was shining. The moon had passed the zenith and 
gone west; this was but the silver mirage of stars far wan¬ 
ing past the Everglades. Mrs. Mallow’s eyes were moon¬ 
struck. Clay’s eyes, too, filled with a wan fire. 

Far away on the shining ocean, past bay, past key, a lean 
white ship was limned. She lay in at the entrance to Bay 
Mimayne, just beyond the narrow cut which sliced through 
the coral rock of Key Mimayne. Laurence excused him¬ 
self, and went forth. But Mrs. Mallow and the son of old 
Thorn Clay stayed, watching long and silently that lean 
white ship, that floating palace of wealth and power, that 
little white chip on the ocean. 

“I wonder if that’s Grady’s ship?” said Clay. 

The ship lay still as a ship of the dead. No motion 
rocked her. Her white strakes were dead men’s bones. 


XXXI. SORROW OF THE DOG-FACED SPHINX 

A NTHONY was packing his bags. He answered 
the insistent questions of Arsen by saying that he 
was going South. 

“To New Orleans, after rum-runners,” he said, in an¬ 
swer to Arsen’s demands. “I’m taking the Gold Express 
tonight. ’ ’ 

“Barcadi rum,” muttered Arsen, thinking of New Or¬ 
leans. “Dark-eyed senoritas. . . . Mardi Gras . . . creole 
guitars. ^ . . 0 Hell! ” 

“I’m not going to play,” said Anthony. 

“A good story just came up from Jackonville over the 


158 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


A. P. wire,” said Arsen with a fleet grin. 4 ‘About old 
Tim Grady. He’s down off the keys now. A fight took 
place on board the Thorn the other night. Someone came 
mighty near being killed. ’ ’ 

Anthony folded shirts and stowed them in a bag. 

“A fisherman passing in hailing distance of the yacht 
got the story,” Arsen explained, “and told it in Palm 
Beach when he came to shore.” 

Anthony turned. His countenance was tense. “What’s 
the story!” 

“You don’t need to bark at me that way,” said Arsen 
sulkily. “Nothing for you to be interested in. 7 might be 
worried. I know Rose Dawn. Know her well,” said Ar¬ 
sen complacently, straightening his cravat. “Well, it 
seems old Grady got drunk the other night, as usual, and 
somehow or other something happened on the Thorn — 
lights went bad, I understand—and old Tim got scared of 
the dark, and threshed around trying to kill everybody he 
could lay his hands on. He tussled with van Chuch—” 
“I thought something had happened,” said Anthony, 
his glance dreadful. 

“Old Tim must have been half crazy,” said Arsen, 
“(though of course we haven’t got the whole story 
straight yet), and van Chuch had to put him in his cabin. 
They had it hot and heavy. Grady claimed van Chuch 
tried to kill him, but I guess it was the other way around. 
You know the law of the sea—the captain is king. That 
elephant coon, Tom, sided with Tim, and the whole crew 
had to hammer him quiet with belaying pins. I’ll bet old 
Grady’s mad as a blue baboon. And scared! He seems 
to think someone is trying to murder him. ’ ’ 

“I’d not be surprised,” said Anthony. 

Arsen’s restless glance had fallen to the rug and its 
woven dog-faced Sphinx. “You never told me what that 
means,” he complained. “Is it a river or a snake? The 
Sphinx looks sad tonight. Is there anything symbolized 
in the whole mess?” 


SORROW OF THE DOG-FACED SPHINX 


159 


“Then yon don’t see it?” 

“I suppose it’s a symbol of fatality,” said Arsen. 
“Wise old Babylonian stuff. But I don’t believe in fate.” 

“I was thinking about Grady,” said Anthony. “You 
don’t believe in foreordination?” 

“O, of«course not,” said Arsen, but doubtfully. “What 
do you take me for? Nobody believes in fate now. I’m 
no fool.” He cocked his ear; Anthony did not confirm 
Arsen’s statement. “Squirmy Schermerhorn doesn’t,” 
Arsen said defiantly, “and he’s smart as anything. A 
fortune teller once said he was fated to fall in love with a 
black-haired girl. But it happens the only girls he loves 
are Rose Dawn, who’s blond, and Maveen Grady, who’s 
Titian, and the Arty Girl, who’s chestnut brown this sea¬ 
son; not counting the girls he takes out on parties, who 
are generally mud-colored. That shows you what fate 
amounts to! ” 

“Some things are fate,” said Anthony after a pause, 
speaking softly and with intense bitterness. “If you die, 
it’s fated you’ll be forgotten. If you hand over your 
soul to a woman, she’ll use it to light a cigaret, and throw 
it in the ash-tray with other burned out flames. And if 
you try to die for a woman, you’ll live on like damned 
Ahasuerus!” 

Sorrowfully the dog-faced Sphinx looked up at Anthony, 
with motionless woven immortality. 

Arsen said: “The dog’s got the blues tonight, though 
it’s pink and purple.” He was restless, and kicked his 
feet. “If there is fate—•” he began argumentatively 
—“well, if there is fate— Take Tim Grady, for instance, 
who’s afraid someone will kill him. Why, I believe you 
said something about him once before,” said Arsen with 
some excitement—‘ ‘ something about fate ! ’ ’ 

Anthony closed his lips. “I talk too much,” said he. 

“So do I,” Arsen admitted frankly. “What makes men 
do it?” 

“Nemesis—the Avenging God.” 


160 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Arsen was thinking. “A mighty interesting thing to 
figure there, if it’s ordained—” 

“I never predicted the old man’s death,” said Anthony 

clearly. 

11 1 thought you did. ’ ’ 

“Great Lord!” said Anthony. “You might kill him 
yourself. ’ ’ 

Arsen drew in his breath, laughing faintly. “I?” 

“Certainly,” said Anthony. “His daughter might fall 
in love with you—since all women are fools—and to get 
her father out of the way, stuff his mouth with bed pillows 
till he choked.” 

* ‘ Maveen Grady, for me! ’ ’ cried Arsen, aghast and de¬ 
lighted. 

‘ ‘ Not likely, but not impossible, ’ ’ said Anthony. * ‘ Play¬ 
ing in Lower California once, I knew a woman went mad 
over a Yaqui Indian. Dirtiest animal you ever saw. But 
she loved this blasted cannibal so much that one night she 
took his tomahawk, and when he was sleeping with his 
squaw— ’ ’ 

“You’re making fun of me,” said Arsen angrily. 

“Murder is fun, the greatest nonsense possible. Except 
love. The two go together.” 

“Tim Grady’s likely to live longer than you or I,” said 
Arsen, ‘ ‘ and lay Rose Dawn beside his other wives. What 
could happen to him?” 

“What’s written is written,” said Anthony. “Though 
I don’t know what’s written.” 

Arsen did not know whether to laugh or be grave. He 
had great faith in all his great friends, and their opinions 
were his own. “My friend, Dr. Bellbender, says this 
is an age of free will,” said Arsen. 

Anthony pulled out a watch, and held it in his palm. 
Click-click! panted the seconds, endeavoring to overtake 
the hour forever gone, forever ahead of them. They 
rustled with the trickling whisper of falling water. 

Shadows and points of light lay on the watch crystal. 


DAWN SUN 


161 


Anthony’s eyes were dark. Wigley Arsen felt small. 

“Here’s the hour hand,” said Anthony, “and the min¬ 
ute hand. They go their own ways. But you and I know 
that some instant they will come together. That hour is 
twelve. It’s the ending of the day. The ending of the 
day—call it the instant of accomplished destiny.” 

“Every day ends some time or another, Tony.” 

“Each ends at twelve, at the hour appointed.” 

Wigley Arsen was not shrewd enough to disclose the 
fallacy in Anthony’s analogy, its specious but reasonable- 
appearing sophistry. 

“Just as sure as time, Wigley Arsen, Tim Grady’s hour 
draws on him!” 

“And your hour on you, and mine on me,” said Arsen. 


XXXII. DAWN SUN 

I N the dusk of earliest morning the Thorn stands off 
Key Mimayne. Up and down van Chuch paces, 
dourly grim. His round, itching nose promises heat 
this day. Red the Sailor, chewing tobacco, holds the 
wheel. Signals have gone shoreward for a pilot to take 
the Thorn through the gut of the key and into the bay. 

“Remember, all you fellows are to tell the Federal of¬ 
ficers that Mr. Grady assaulted me wuthout reason!” van 
Chuch warns Red the Sailor. “He’s crazy!” 

“Year the Caping,” says Red. 

“Rouse out that coon Tom. Set him to swabbing down 
decks.” 

“Ay, ay!” Red spits. Charmed, I’m sure! (thinks 
he). 

Against the western black of sky ripple dawn winds. 
On the shore they toss crested palms, awake the peony, 
hibiscus, orchid, hyacinth, and many another gay and 
gaudy flower with names like the angels of Heaven. Dark 


162 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


rivers from the marshes lap their fenny banks. The sea 
grows lavender and violet. 

The Thorn tosses her white flanks in rainbow waters. 
The dawn winds blow the stars from ont the sky. The 
east is shaken with the thunder of the sun! 

Crimson and purple is the rising dawn, an emperor of 
Araby or Cathay, wrapped in twelve glorious mantles. 
Passion and tremendous fire, heart of the earth, the tropic 
dawn! Peacock clouds, fluttering with a cry. The tiger 
sun, lashing, feral, leaping on their trail. “Behold!” 
cry the rejoicing winds. “God is arisen!” 

As Rose leaned over the railing and looked far over 
coloring waters at the sun, a hint of the hushed sea was in 
her blue eyes. Like the sea they took color and a fire. 
She breathed deeply, shaking her golden curls. 

Van Chuch stood beside her, resting his knuckles on his 
hip. “Going to be a hot day,” he said. She did not an¬ 
swer. Van Chuch thought he had never seen her look 
more beautiful, never quite so alive. “I hope you’ll 
stand with me, Mrs. Grady. I’m going to carry this 
through against Mr. Grady! ’ ’ 

“That is between you and him,” Rose said. “You are 
captain at sea;” (van Chuch was surprised at her tone 
of passion) “he’s master on shore!” 

“Who’s master, dearie?” Mrs. Higgs gawped, coming 
from her cabin. She patted her mouth delicately, flash¬ 
ing rings to the sun. “When are you letting Grady out 
of his cabin, Capting? If you was me you’d just natchelly 
send him to jail for attacking and assaulting and hitting 
you. I got a word to say to him myself. He kept me 
awake all night last night with his cussing—” 

With muffled engines the Thorn rumbled through the 
cut of Key Mimayne, sandy dikes pressing her close on 
either hand, Her slicing sides sucked water underneath. 
The pale waters of Bay Mimayne, shut off from ocean by 
the coral keys, took the Thorn gently. Southwest she 
plowed across the bay. A dory carrying newspaper men 


DAWN SUN 


163 


tried to hail her, but van Chuch waved them off. A steam 
dredge shrilled blasted greeting. A seaplane, dipping 
and skimming, bustled out with thunderous buzzing. On 
one wing it whirled about the Thorn, and little Boosten 
Claude leaned out to wave. 

Maveen smoked cigarets and ate chocolates as they made 
across shallow waters to the main shore. She devoured a 
novel redder than her hair, all about life in the small 
towns, dutifully thanking God she was not born in the 
Mid-west. 

The crew of the Thorn, in dirty brown uniforms blue- 
trimmed, bellowed nautical blasphemies at one another. 
Red the Sailor stood guard over black Tom, who on hands 
and knees holystoned the fore deck. Red supplied many 
exhortations, as: “Dig into it, black boy!—Hey, youse! 
Put more beef in it! Year not massaging year grand¬ 
mother’s back. Wipe it with year nose, smoke!” Tom 
worked silently. Now and again he lifted his head, sniff¬ 
ing the warm air. 

An old song of the sea arose. Far and mightily had 
the singers ventured, and now they cast moorings on the 
magic isles. Briny their words, deepseawise, pelagic as 
ocean weed, as they roared and laughed at each other. 
The Thorn neared the palmy mouth of Black River. 

Rose thought, listening to the men, that they were right 
brave fellows, after all, and heroic. Vaguely she remem¬ 
bered Ulysses, the Phoenicians and the tri-remed Saracens, 
the old Norse sea-kings. Vaguely, for she was not classh 
cal. Her golden head (it seems unlikely) was less pon¬ 
derous than many a bald one. 

It may be in the dirty sailor fellows really stirred, as 
Rose thought, vague memories of heroic ages, only half 
dissolved in death’s forgetting. Memories of Red Eric 
and Lief Ericson sweeping forth to lay the tropics at their 
feet, twenty ships of loud-lunged warriors roaring down 
the sea lanes together! Of storms flailed beneath iron- 
shod prows. Of men “the sea lay in whose hands.” 


164 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


But not likely they had such memories. The sailors 
labored for their pay and chow; men do the same ashore. 
They dreamed, as do all men who go down to the sea in 
ships, of liquor and ready women. They were glad of the 
land. 

Rose walked slowly towards Maveen, head back, drink¬ 
ing deep the sultry morning. Her lips were apart, as 
though the wind were a lover. Maveen had never seen such 
vivid emotion in her young step-mother’s face. 

“You look wild this morning, Rose. Ready to do any¬ 
thing once.” 

Into Black River the Thorn’s bow cut. Ripples stirred. 
Trees nodded. Something unseen plumped into the water 
with a splash. Above palms loomed the Royal Poinsettia 
hotel, a great yellow wooden elephant big as two castles. 
The Thorn headed for the hotel’s quay. The river banks, 
overblown with rioting grass, pressed so close it seemed they 
could be touched with hands. 

“First time I’ve ever been so far south,” said Maveen. 
“Everything looks green and sticky. It makes me feel 
lazy.” She stretched her silk hose. “It was some place 
around here that old Spaniard found his fountain of 
eternal youth.” 

Van Chuch overheard. “Of eternal death you mean, 
Miss Grady.” 

“O Pete, Pete, Pete! You are so sweet!” Maveen sang 
derisively, giving him a wicked glance. 

They cast off lines, making them fast to chock and pile 
on the quay. The ungeared engines died. Van Chuch 
ordered out a gangplank from the bow. He had headed 
the Thorn down river. A dozen or more winter idlers, re¬ 
porters, roustabouts, and curious coons were waiting on the 
dock. 

“What’s this story about Mr. Grady?” a journalist 
bawled. 

Black Tom Jefferson was jigging on the forward deck. 
A half dozen white men squatted about him, laughing and 


DAWN SUN 


165 


beating the deck. Some of the negroes on the quay imi¬ 
tated Tom. The negro swung his gorilla shoulders loosely, 
slack as a doll on a wire. His shuffling shoes never missed 
a beat. He cracked his fingers. The sailors laughed; and 
Tom laughed back, shaking his shaved head. “Go it, 
T om! ’ ’—‘ ‘ African shimmy! ’ ’—* ‘ Ow-wow! ’ ’—‘ 1 Shake a 
leg, black boy!”—“Getting hot!” 

Tom sang a song he improvised, rhymeless, yet musical 
and harmonious. “I’m coming home!” he sang throatily. 
“I’m coming home!’’ 

“I’m coming home, I’m coming home! 

Smell those palm trees; hear them singing. 

No more cold, and no more snow; 

No more work for Uncle Joe. . . .” 

Tom swung his mighty arms more furiously, slumping 
them against his ribs, infuriating himself. His beating 
shoes were drums, sounding monotonous as the ocean. His 
eyes rolled. Perspiration streamed. It was a war dance 
now he did, and his eyes grew fierce. War-light of the 
kings of the jungle! 

Midst of the dance heat he stopped, suddenly aware of 
himself. Scowling, silent, looking at no one, he stamped 
away. 

“What’s the matter, smoke?” asked Red. “Give us 
some more ! ’ ’ 

Tom grumbled. “Trying to make a fool of me. I— 
why I, damn it! I’m educated!” 

“Year in fer trouble, smoke!” warned Red. “We’ll 
take no belly-wash from coons. We’ll swab out year 
mouth with soap and water.” 

Van Chuch, coming forward, drove them away. 

Late in the morning Tim Grady awoke and pressed his 
face to his stateroom window. The windows, wide and 
clear, were nailed down from outside, and the door was 
locked. Tim stuck his mouth close to a small porthole, and 
screamed. 


166 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“So we’re here, are we? Van Chuch! Van Chuch! 
Chuch, Chuch, Chuch! 0, damn ye, Dutchman, where are 

ye? Ye’ll hang for this! And the rest o’ ye—iver last 
one o’ ye—ye bums—the curse of Cromwell on ye—ye’re 
fired! Git off my ship!” He saw Tom. “Let me out of 
here, ye nigger, and help me kick the gang of them from 
off my ship ! ’ ’ 

Since Grady had spent most of the past two days in 
suchlike bowlings, no one paid him much attention. 


XXXIII. WIGLEY ARSEN AT LARGE 

“Tk M~ R. PADRIAC GRADY—where is he?” Arsen 

^/■ demanded. He surveyed the club attendant, 
y JL “I say, you, aren’t you the fellow used to 
buttle at Dawnrose?” 

Saltpeter, that button-faced man, bowed smugly. ‘ ‘ Here 
temporarily during Mr. Grady’s absence South, Mr. Ar¬ 
sen,” he explained. Arsen was pleased at being remem¬ 
bered by name; he cast a side glance at Schermerhorn to 
see if Schermerhorn had noticed. “Mr. Padriac’s not in 
town, Sir. He took the Gold Express last night.” 

Squirmy had led Arsen into his club. He draped him¬ 
self through the air like the Washington monument, feebly 
clawing at his mustache. “What’s all the frenzied row 
about Grady, Arse?” 

Arsen had no particular reason to see Padriac; but he 
liked to mention well known men. It made him well 
known. “A big story,” he said mysteriously. 

Schermerhorn, who didn’t give a hoot about all the 
famous people Arsen knew, was much impressed by Arsen’s 
air of mystery. Journalism seemed to him quite as grand 
a thing as society seemed to Arsen. “I wish I were a 
jolly old reporter,” he said discontentedly. “All the wise 
eggs I know are reporters.” 

Saltpeter asked Mr. Arsen if there was anything else. 



WIGLEY ARSEN AT LARGE 


167 


“Everyone knows me,” Arsen said to Schermerhorn, “even 
the butlers. I can’t go any place, Squirmy, that some con¬ 
founded fellow doesn’t pop up and call me by name.” 

“Rotten! I hate it, too,” said Squirmy, instead of be¬ 
traying jealousy. 

Urban Wiggs, that fat dull fool, wandered up to Scher¬ 
merhorn ; newspaper in hand, fat cigar drooping from fat 
lips. The fat man typical to all good clubs, less dispen¬ 
sable than leather lounge chairs, card-room, or stone fire¬ 
place. Urban groaned; apparently he always groaned. 
He whiffled; apparently he always whiffled. Schermerhorn 
introduced him to Arsen. 

Arsen was delighted, though Wiggs only grunted. “Not 
the famous Urban Wiggs?” Urban groaned, to show he 
was not famous. 11 1 know your father, the famous lawyer, 
well; and your mother is a very close friend ! ” cried Arsen. 

Wiggs groaned again. He loathed his father, his mother 
he hated. He did not respond cordially to Arsen’s cordial¬ 
ity, having no means of knowing Arsen’s great-grand¬ 
father had been a gentleman. In fact, he quite ignored 
Arsen. Twining arms with Squirmy, who he knew was all 
right, he walked into the bar, letting Arsen trail behind 
like a chattering little dog. Arsen talked about Urban’s 
mother’s grandfather, who everyone knew had been a 
gentleman. It was not quite clear whether this per¬ 
sonage had been one of Arsen’s close friends. 

Squirmy spoke to the bartender who poured prohibition 
pilsner and sad ginger cocktails. A locker was opened. 
They glanced about them. Tumblers appeared. Then 
they were off. 

Wiggs brightened as drinks departed. He began to look 
at Arsen as though at something human. Arsen listened 
for some sapient word he could later retail. 

“To crime!” toasted Squirmy, after his formula, proud 
of being a wit. “Did you read in the Morning Mist about 
the rumpus on the Grady yacht, Urb ? Everybody’s laugh¬ 
ing about it.” 


168 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Urban groaned. “No. Grady is old fool. Never ought 
to have got married. ” 

“I’d ha’ married her myself,” said Squirmy. “Always 
was hellishly passionate about her. ’ ’ 

“I’d marry her now, with Grady’s money,” Urban con¬ 
ceded. He sagged and wheezed like a circus elephant 
sitting on a tub. “Stinking place, the South!” he groaned. 
“Got letter from Larry Spencer. Fellow tried to knife 
Larry other night. Larry busted left arm fighting war, 
but made whooping scrap of it. Caught the fellow. Little 
greaser name o ’ Lopez. Trying to hold him up after poker 
game. 1 don’t want to get knifed.” Urban groaned. “2 
don’t want to get knifed,” he insisted. 

‘ 1 Larry Spencer—I know him well! ’ ’ said Arsen, feeling 
ignored. 

“Fool to get married,” groaned Urban, speaking of Tim 
Grady. “Fool to go South. He’ll be knifed, too; if he 
doesn’t get yellow fever.” 

Arsen thought of what Anthony had said the night be¬ 
fore. “What makes you think that?” Urban ignored 
Arsen. Sehermerhorn repeated the question. 

“Whole town knows she tried poison him, Squirm,” 
young Wiggs grunted, startling both Squirmy and Arsen. 
“Maybe not whole town. Got it fr’ m’ old man.” 

‘ ‘ Sacred blasphemy, dear old fool! ’ ’ squeaked Schermer- 
horn. 

“M’ old man got it fr’ police 1’tenant, name o’ Mac- 
Ercher,” said Urban, almost too weary for speech. “Don’ 
know where M’ercher got ’t. Um-hum! Hell’sh liquor. 
Secret stuff. No’ wor’ ’bout ’t.” 

“Not a word!” promised Squirmy, quite startled out 
of his wit. 

Afternoon passed to night, and much of Squirmy’s liquor 
to destruction. The world had become a blur. Arsen sat 
dizzily thinking. 

That evening he wandered into the Mist’s city room 
with mazy motion. Sailed his hat over a dozen clacking 


WIGLEY ARSEN AT LARGE 


169 


typewriters. Draped his coat on the floor. Tucked his 
neat black tie behind his ear. “Ge’ Tim Grady’s life 
from morgue! ” he thickly commanded a rudderless copy 
boy. ‘ ‘Wha’s news from South wire? Isay—I say some¬ 
body’s going to be murdered!” 

The city editor did not look up. “Which one of your 
intimate friends gave you the hooch, Wig?” he asked 
wearily. He didn’t think the news was worth an extra. 


XXXIV. THE GOLD EXPRESS 

O VER the Gold Express, stammering southward, 
comes midnight and dawn and noon. Through 
Baltimore tunnels in frosty gray light; through 
Washington tunnel and over the river; into Richmond and 
out again before noon is high. Dim hills far away walk 
south with it. Mellow melting snows patch the earth. 

Anthony, sitting in the observation car, looked up to meet 
Padriac Grady’s stare. Anthony did not know his vis-a- 
vis’s name, but remembered well enough having seen him 
once in a little movie theater on lower Broadway. Pad¬ 
riac looked him over in the way they have at old Yale; not 
with personal malice, but with the normal hostile insolence 
which is the prerogative of all men who ride the Gold 
Express. 

Padriac strolled to the rear platform, his clothes flapping 
in dusty vortexes about a frame which showed itself strong 
and tall. Carefully he lit a cigar, smoked it from the 
tip, exhaling in quick disgusted puffs. After an instant 
he threw the weed away, rocking dizzily with the motion 
of the train. He leaned over the brass railing, his head 
in his hands. 

Anthony, having some curiosity and no scruples, arose 
and examined Padriac’s unclasped bag. No passengers 
were in the car. Sprawled full length in a chair, the 
porter snored through his official cap. Reading Padriac’s 


170 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


name brought a train of thoughts to Anthony. He had 
surmised the son of old Tim Grady would be a different 
sort of man. 

Nothing untoward appeared when he opened the bag, 
not even the customary green bottle. On top was a photo¬ 
graph of Rose Dawn, proudly staring from her perch on 
a pair of socks. Rose Dawn at the period of her greatest 
fame, not more than a year before; Rose Dawn of “Sin/’ 
far more polished and confident than she had ever seemed 
in times w T hen hearts were afire. Anthony made a bitter 
mouth. Certainly she was beautiful. 

He was afraid young Grady might have seen his liberty. 
Anthony pretended to have lost his ticket. The porter 
startled from dreams, diligently crawling about on the 
aisle, till Anthony made play of finding the ticket in his 
wallet. 

But not before a bald, square-faced, square-headed man, 
lurching from the dining car with a frail blond specimen 
of girlhood trailing him, had endeavored to help Anthony. 
That necessitated introductions; and Anthony gave a card 
indicating he was “A. B. See, Toilet Goods, Atlanta”; 
receiving in exchange the card of Higgleson Todd, of Todd, 
Todd, Todd, and Todd, attorneys and counsellors at law. 

Mr. Todd drew himself in when he found Anthony was 
nothing more than Toilet Goods. He turned to his com¬ 
panion without more words. “0, Miss Dubby!” 

Mary Dubby fluttered feebly. She appeared to search 
for a pencil in her hair. 

Padriac Grady lurched in from the platform. Todd 
popped from his seat, seeing him with red dismay. He 
had no time to flee. “Mr. Grady, how are you! Sur¬ 
prised to see you here! Surprised!” Todd didn’t look 
like he was lying. His forehead glistened. He released 
Grady’s unenthusiastic hand to mop his brow clear back 
to his neck. “Going to Daytona. Just a little business, a 
little business. Surprised! Whew! Hot weather! And 
you, Mr. Grady?” 


THE GOLD EXPRESS 


171 


To Jacksonville,” Padriac said drily. He looked curi¬ 
ously at Miss Dubby, whom he did not recognize; and she 
gazed haughtily back from beneath pale arched brows. 
“I’ve heard Jacksonville is lively,” said Padriac, striv¬ 
ing to speak nonchalantly. His eyes drifted to Miss Dubby 
again. 

“Too lively for you; ha, ha!” Mr. Todd was near to 
hysterics. He wished his beloved Miss Dubby at the bot¬ 
tom of the deep. He wished her frail blond head back in 
the moon whence it came. In the affairs of other men his 
mind was legal, cold, and precise; but in his own affairs 
he was panicky. Seeing Padriac’s interest in Mary, Todd 
glubbed unintelligibly : 11 My wife, Mr. Grady! ’’ 

Padriac did not know Todd was a bachelor. He was not 
interested in Miss Dubby, and forgot the introduction an 
hour afterward. But Anthony remembered. And so, you 
may lay odds, did Miss Dubby. The cat that ate cream 
was never half so sweet. 

“So you think Jacksonville’s all right for a little fun?” 
Padriac asked. 

“Ha, ha! I guess you’d be all right any place, Padriac 
Grady.” 

Padriac did not take pleasantly this compliment, though 
it should have cheered any nice young man. Later that 
day Todd caught him staring long at his face in a smok¬ 
ing-room mirror. Padriac scowled, pretended to hunt for 
a wen. He would not let Todd know he had been looking 
to see what his face lacked which makes women passion¬ 
ately love a man’s face at first sight. Perhaps he didn’t 
use the right sort of soap. 

But now Todd and his lady friend laid low. Mary 
Dubby was not nearly so flustered as her employer, or 
whatever you want to call him. Secretly Miss Dubby de¬ 
bated if she should address him as Higg. Possibly she 
was not quite as much of a sap as Todd had once called 
her. 

Padriac paced up and down in front of Anthony several 


172 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


times, speaking at last. “I’m sorry. But aren’t you an 
actor ?” 

Anthony looked up, startled; he gripped his knees. 

“Actors I’ve known were always pretty good men for 
living well,” Padriac stammered. “I’m asking you 
frankly— How would a man that’s never done it start 
out to have a good time?” 

A difficult question, of course. Anthony slid out by the 
easiest way. “I’m A. B. See, Toilet Goods,” he said 
brusquely. “You’ve made a mistake.” 

“I beg your pardon, Mr. Goods,” Padriac retreated. 

That ended conversation. Anthony’s manner was re- 
pellant. All through that day, as they thundered and 
rocked southward through nearing summers, Anthony was 
aware the man across the aisle was still looking at him. 
Vague premonition rose that sometime they might exchange 
looks with less unconcern. 

Next morning the Gold Express reached Jacksonville. 
Anthony left, feeling eyes watching him all the way down 
the platform. He turned and saw young Grady slowly 
walking after him, amber glasses on his eyes, as though this 
Southern sun was too hot for him. 

Anthony hurried into a waiting room. The Gold Ex¬ 
press lingered twenty minutes, and went on south to 
Biscayne. 


XXXV. DAY OF DOOM: DIM MORNING: MAN 

HUNT 


f* | ^HEY’VE arrested Greasy Pete Lopez for at¬ 
tempted banditry on young Laurence Spencer; 
and they’ve put police to guard him. But he’s 
a snake that can wriggle free; and he’s a rat that can run 
away. He’s broken clean from Hell-hot Biscayne jail! 
The nets are set for him. He creeps along the dawn. 
Near the railroad, in the town’s center, a mile from the 



DIM MORNING: MAN HUNT 


173 


bay and all cool breezes, is a mean little wooden house 
flaunting like an old drab: “For Rent.” A narrow cor¬ 
ner of attic crammed beneath the roof, well suited to soak 
up all heat of tropic days, is Gay Deleon’s lodging. 

Deleon sleeps on a cot. Quite different this from Park 
Avenue, with birds and icemen whistling in the dawn. 
Even in sleep his hair is slick like a wet cat, his insolent 
mustaches are waxed. He wears heliotrope silk pajamas. 

On the golden oak bureau are a torn cracker box, opened 
tins of stale cottonseed-oil sardines, numerous bills, three 
white poker chips, a wilted rose-bud, a small drugstore- 
phial of ‘some colorless fluid, and a purse, quite flat. 

Deleon’s fat chin sags. He tosses, pursued by devil 
dreams. High sun streaks in his window, burning his hairy 
chest, focusing on his eyelids. He awakes, mouthing dis¬ 
gust. Shivering, scratching his eyes, he creeps to the 
bureau, looking for a watch long since in hock. The mess 
of food and trash nauseates him. With an oath he sweeps 
that to the floor, catching up the phial. 

The colorless fluid in the phial may be Canadian gin, and 
it may be carbolic. Improbably it is water. Deleon re¬ 
moves the cork, sniffing it. For a moment he appears to 
debate. To be or not to be! But one answer. 

Of course it wasn’t gin, for Deleon threw the stuff 
viciously out the window. Glass tinkled below. Deleon 
wondered in what spirit of courage he could have bought 
it. Thinking more fully of that hateful stuff, he gagged. 
He fell back on a chair, lowly muttering the first name of 
God. 

The door-hinges creaked. The doorknob softly began to 
turn. Deleon watched in fascination and fear. “Don’t 
say anything! Aw r ake, Gay ? ’ ’ Cunning and brown and 
quick of eye, but panting deep, Pete Lopez crept in. 

“Where did you come from!” 

“From Heaven, like the angels. Not so loud, Gay! I’ll 
be on my way soon. They’re after me. They’re hot 
around me, old Dawn’s men! I’ll try to make for Mali- 


174 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


mus. Wait; listen. It’s funny! Two fat cops guarding 
me in the calaboose!”—Pete bowed with silent laughter. 
“I lifted a gun from one of ’em, held ’em up, and breezed 
away, leaving ’em locked with their feet in the air. Spike 
and Stubb— If you ever get to jail, give them my com¬ 
pliments.” 

Gay paced up and down on the edges of his bare feet. 
“They’ll be looking for you here first of all! You crazy 
fool, beat it!” 

“I’m going to. To Malimus tonight. McGinty has the 
boat.” 

“Well, beat it! I haven’t got any money for you. I’m 
cleaned. You know how luck’s been running against me. 
Sometimes I think of killing myself.” 

Pete chuckled. “Don’t fool yourself. You’d sooner see 
the whole world die.” 

“Do you know what’s happened? I’ve lost my car to 
this gun-toting assassin, this magneto-mouthed Boosten 
Claude. You bet I didn’t give it to him! I turned it over 
to McGinty; he ’ll give me half of what he gets from hack¬ 
ing it. But no money’s in from that. Think of me turned 
to that for money to live! ’ ’ 

“It’s a good graft. If my mother hadn’t raised me 
honest, I’d ha’ turned out a chauffeur,” said Pete. 

“And Claude’s after me! I can’t give him a cent. I’m 
desperate, Pete. I don’t know which way to turn. If I 
had that ten thousand—” 

“How about old Grady, Gay? Some sort of blackmail 
over Rose?” 

“Not a thing there. Not a chance! What could I 
bring up?” 

“I signed her name once to a letter for John Dawn,” 
Pete said coolly. “I can sign her name now to a letter 
for you, or me, or Larry Spencer. She’d pay high to get 
it back. Or old Grady would.” 

“You dirty dog! f’m fond of her!” 


DIM MORNING: MAN HUNT 


175 


Pete laughed at that. 

Someone was coming up the stairs, trampling higher, 
flight by flight. Pete squirmed beneath the cot; and 
Deleon lay down, pretending sleep. He called: “Come 
in! ” at a knock. 

Two officers, in faded blue coats and dusty gray helmets, 
entered uneasily. They spoke by turns, taking words 
from each other’s mouth, nudging each other on. “Mr. 
Deleon, your friend Lopez—” “Has give the slip to Spike 
and me—” “And Stubb and me wanted to see—” 

Spike w r as evidently he with narrow head surmounted 
by stiff brown bristles. Stubb was a butter-ball, broad as 
he w r as long, coming to Spike’s top button. They were 
both embarrassed, no doubt at Deleon’s silk pajamas. 

“I know nothing!” Deleon said loudly. “If you find 
him, tell me.” 

“We’ll do that, Sir—” “With pleasure.” They cast 
their eyes about in perfunctory search; and clumped down 
the stairs, glad to be gone. 

Pete crawled out. “I’ll dust away tonight,” he whis¬ 
pered, not smiling now. “I’ll stick close here today, Gay.” 

Deleon did not fancy that. “You’ll drag me into your 
messes! You’ll put the jinx on me! Old Dawrn hates me 
—he’d not mind shoving me behind bars! ’ ’ 

“That’d be tough,” Pete jeered. “I’ve swilled enough 
jail grub for things you did or wanted done. You can 
do the same for me. I’ve put my neck in the noose for 
you—you ’ll stand by me now! ’ ’ 

“O, easy, easy. I’m not going to turn you over to 
Dawrn. ’ ’ 

“No,” said Pete softly, with glittering eyes. “You’d 
better not! Suppose I let slip a word to Mrs. Weinvoll 
about— ’ ’ 

“All right! All right! In the name of death!” 

Walls were thin between the attic rooms. Deleon 
thought he heard someone stirring. 


176 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


XXXVI. DAY OF DOOM: FAIR MORNING: 

SAND FRINGES 

G AUDY as a rainbow were sand and sea, bright 
spots of color speckling them, green, yellow, crim¬ 
son. Below, frothy wavelets washed the sand; 
the stark noon sun above. Under striped and checkered 
awnings awfully beautiful girls lolled, or sprawled, or 
flopped, or burrowed in the sand. Their bathing-caps 
were candle flames. Their bathing-suits scorned the 
scorching morning and blushed the day to shame. 

Peter van Chuch, strutting on short bow legs and puffing 
out his chest, paraded on the beach, conscious that old Tim 
Grady was furiously surveying him. Van Chuch was fol¬ 
lowed by his own admiring flock. Van Chuch was not 
particularly lovely, and he had a paunch; but in Biscayne 
young men are rare. Old Grady watched beneath a mar¬ 
quee, his hands folded on his stomach. At periods he 
grunted. “Chuch, Chuch, Chuch! The Dutchman!” 

“That’s the man locked Grady in his own cabin,” said 
Mrs. Weinvoll, of Milwaukee, Wis. “They say he’s sweet 
on the Grady girl.” 

“My hotel room looks out on the river,” said Mrs. Dusty 
Hoag, of Waco, Tex. “I heard Grady yelling and singing 
on the Thorn till all hours of morning.” 

“High jinks!” said Mrs. Weinvoll, nodding shrewdly. 
“His wife wasn’t around, I’ll bet. I hear she’s going to 
leave him and take rooms in the hotel, like the Grady girl 
has went and done.” 

“Do you know what he’s done? He’s fired all his crew; 
and he’s got only one big black nigger left to wait on him. 
It’ll give his wife a good chance to learn to cook.” 

Mrs. Weinvoll laughed heartily, causing Mrs. Hoag to 
flush. “I’ve done my own cooking,” Mrs. Hoag said hon¬ 
estly. “And so’ve you, I bet.” 

‘ ‘ My dear! My dear! ’ ’ shrilled Mrs. Weinvoll, throwing 



FAIR MORNING: SAND FRINGES 


177 


up her arms as she’d often seen Rose Dawn do in the 
movies. 11 Don’t speak of it! ” 

Mrs. Weinvoll was in swimming suit of lavender and 
pink. She was a lady small above, but very large be¬ 
low; something like a kangaroo. Mrs. Hoag wore solemn 
black skirts reaching nearly to her ankles. The Texan 
lady was tall, and mostly joints and angles. She was 
dark of skin and hair, very serious and Methodistic. Like 
Mrs. Weinvoll, she found it not too easy to begin being 
frivolous at fifty years. 

In the water Bunnie Hoag, a dark chit of seventeen, 
sported with Larry Spencer. Mrs. Hoag eyed her tenderly. 
All the dreams of her ugly grim years, all her joyless 
youth, found new life in her daughter. She would have 
plucked forth her eyes for Bunnie to shoot at marbles. 
Though she was gawky, and bony, and hideously dressed, 
in that moment there was nothing lovelier on the beach than 
Mrs. Dusty Hoag, of Waco, Texas. 

Mrs. Weinvoll watched her own daughter with not such 
great satisfaction. Arethusa was kneeling on the sand, 
happily endeavoring to bury Gay Deleon alive. Mrs. 
Weinvoll did not like Gay’s dapper black hair, his sleek 
ways, the fat he wore amidships. She suspected he was 
more interested in the very certain Weinvoll fortune than 
in the less certain beauty of her daughter, charming though 
Arethusa was when garbed for the amorous sea. 

She called: * 1 Come here a minute, Thusy! Thus-ee ! ’ ’ 
But Arethusa continued her maidenly mirth, paying no 
attention. 

“I don’t trust that feller Deleon,” Mrs. Weinvoll com¬ 
plained. ‘ ‘ Though he seems to know everybody and stand 
right up to the best. He even knows Rose Dawn.” 

Mrs. Hoag assented. “He looks to me like a man out in 
Texas who cheated Dusty out o’ everything we had. 
Dearie me! It was dreadful hard!” 

Mrs. Weinvoll twitched. “Why, they was a feller looked 
like that used to know Weinvoll! It was before Wein- 


178 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


voll—” The fate of Mr. Weinvoll must not be mentioned. 
“It was before we had our trouble. Listen! Was a little 
foreign-looking feller with him, dark-complected like, with 
mean eyes?” 

“Greasy Pete!” Mrs. Hoag gasped. “Could it be the 
same, y ’ s’pose ?” 

Mrs. Weinvoll looked at Deleon, shaking her head. Much 
as she disliked him, she was secretly proud her Arethusa 
knew a Deleon who knew the Gradys. “It couldn’t be,” 
she said. “He knows the Gradys. He’s way up in New 
York society. Why, I’ve saw him myself dancing with 
Rose Dawn.” 

Bunnie Hoag was all in scarlet. She was vivacious, 
quick, and much attracted to Laurence. On the water 
and in the sand she splashed about, looking like a little 
boiled lobster or a red devilfish. Patiently Laurence tried 
to teach her to swim. He wore a kind smile, and she— 
she wore her little scarlet suit. Sundry impertinent waves 
interrupted the swimming lesson, rushing up and throwing 
Bunnie into his arms. She clung about his neck, squeal¬ 
ing. Deeper and deeper they went out, she luring him on 
to scarlet destruction. 

Cigaret smoke drifted. Women dried their hair with 
slow, shimmering arms. Occasionally one of the bright 
beach throng, more hardy or more restless than most, 
darted up and sprang, or bounded, or waddled down to 
the indigo waters. Then over the miraculous blue of sea 
was a bright cap floating, or a dipping bobble of hair, 
and an arm far out again and again reaching forth to strike 
the languid ocean. Farthest of all swam Rose Dawn, 
out so far her blue cap could not be seen. 

Boosten Claude stood on his hands for the squealing ad¬ 
miration of a female audience. “0, dear Mr. Claude! 
Do do that again!” urged Mrs. Mallow, pouting. “How 
strong you are! ’ ’ And little Claude, who w r as five feet and 
one inch, stuck out his chest till it nearly exploded. 

‘ ‘ Thusy! 0 Thus-ee! ’ ’ 



FAIR MORNING: SAND FRINGES 


179 


Arethusa did not give even a flip of her tongue at her 
mother. Milk white her arms and neck. In her boy’s 
bathing-suit the size of a dish-rag she lay down, letting 
Deleon heap sand on her. She wiggled her freckled little 
nose, closed her freckled little eyes. Deleon looked at her 
with silent ardor, his glances speaking a language known 
as well to Milwaukee as Biscayne, perhaps to Heaven. 
Many a wiser girl than Thusy had felt her pulses tremble 
at those black eyes! 

In pink sweater-coat and pale green skirt Maveen Grady 
sat on a beach chair, digging a bright green parasol in the 
sand. Like all women illy dressed, she was angry. Van 
Chuch stalked up and down before her, chest thrown out, 
arms folded, uncertain if to speak. She paid no attention 
to him. Furiously she watched Laurence and Bunnie 
Hoag. 

A huge billow, the ninth wave, rolled inward, sending 
both of those swimmers down to weedy depths. Bunnie 
opened her mouth to shriek, and swallowed the whole ocean. 
She began to swim valiantly. Surprised at this show of 
skill, Laurence stared at her. Laughing, he trotted out of 
the water and up the shore. Bunnie he abandoned to the 
unkind ocean and a fate no doubt horrific. 

Maveen summoned him imperiously, greeting him with 
sulks. “That girl in red must be very interesting,” she 
snapped. “That young Hoag person, I mean.” Viciously 
she jabbed at a tiny sand-chigoe, whose life by a hair 
escaped untimely fate. 

Maveen’s garments of pink and pale green made Lau¬ 
rence shudder. “What’s the matter with you?” he asked. 
On a pretext he removed the pink silk coat. 

“The matter is father!” Maveen was not less pretty 
than she was angry. Her green eyes were hazy, like the 
sky before storm. “He ought to know he can’t drink in 
the South like he can in New York. I’m tired of having 
to apologize for him!” 

Laurence did not know what to say. He murmured 


180 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


something. He was uncomfortable as though Maveen had 
begun publicly to undress. 

“And chasing around after that Mallow woman! If I 
were Rose, I’d not stand for it. I would not! You know 
what she is! ” 

Laurence couldn’t think of the right answer. To say no 
would brand him a fool. To say yes would make Maveen 
jealous. He said nothing. 

“He had a party for her on the Thorn last night,” 
Maveen said lowly. “A lot of men who call themselves 
the Suicide Club—Colonel Dawn, and that Mr. Claude you 
met at Dawnrose once; and her. There’s no crew on now, 
you know, but Tom. Lucky Rose and her mother weren’t 
there. And I wouldn’t stay. I left and got a room at the 
Poinsettia. That Mallow woman was probably on the 
Thorn all night. You can guess the rest.” 

The modern young woman’s frankness confounds nice 
young men. Laurence squirmed his toes. Laurence had 
an idea Rose Dawn was with Gay Deleon the night be¬ 
fore. He tried to cough easily. 

Maveen lit a cigaret. Her lustrous hair was like im¬ 
possibly fine copper filaments, quavering magnetically in 
the heat waves of the sun. 

“Where is your father?” Laurence asked, to turn her 
aside. 

Old Grady sat beneath his striped marquee not many 
yards distant, scowlingly watching his daughter. His 
hands twitched; so did his nose. His huge bulk was sunk 
low in his chair. Grady was suffering from an ingrowing 
disposition. He was ready to curse God and die, if that 
be possible. 

“Why do you ask me where he is?” Maveen retorted to 
Laurence. “I only see him when he’s drunk. Don’t look 
at me so—so sacredly. I haven’t any filial respect. He’s 
always telling me to honor his gray hairs.” Maveen 
sniffed. 


FAIR MORNING: SAND FRINGES 


181 


The hopping sand-chigoe skipped up, unwarned by its 
previous short escape from death. Bright murder was in 
Maveen’s eyes. Warily she raised her green parasol and 
stabbed the little insect. Vain its silent screams, vain the 
supplication in its eyes, vain the hopeful skipping on its 
giddy little legs! The parasol point squashed it. Its life 
pulsed out. Its manes passed to its ancestors, to the vast 
hordes of slaughtered insects which lie beyond the Styx. 
It would hop no more. 

“Thus-ee! Thus-ee!” Shouting noisily, Mrs. Weinvoll 
went down the beach like a kangaroo, and extracted the 
milk-white Arethusa from Deleon. She was a little proud 
at being seen near Deleon, who knew the Gradys. “I 
want you to come and meet my friend Mis’ Hoag, 
Thusy. ’ ’ 

Deleon walked saucily over to Maveen, smoothing his 
slick hair. No one could think he had the same morning 
contemplated suicide. He looked proud as a skunk. Ma¬ 
veen was very pleasant, though Laurence looked away. 
Few w T ere the women who did not admire Deleon. Re¬ 
membering Laurence had once forbidden her to dance with 
Gay, Maveen took pains to be particularly nice to the 
gambler. 

“I’m planning a supper-dance some evening, Gay Deleon. 
You must come. You know I like to dance with you.” 

Deleon pressed her elbow. Laurence went down to the 
sea. 

Swimming far out, Rose Dawn struck for shore. She 
splashed out of the shallow shore ripples, shaking water 
from her shoulders, slapping her thigh with her bathing 
cap. Her damp gold hair was in curly knots. 

Bathers arose from the sand and followed her slowly. 
f 1 That Rose Dawn ? ’ ’— 1 ‘ Surely. It’s Rose Dawn herself. ’’ 
—“Well, by George! Rose Dawn!”—“Yes, indeed. Rose 
Dawn.” So the elegant people stared her over, parading 
behind her. Maybe they thought she was going to sprout 


182 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


wings. Maybe that she would explode. “I’ve seen her 
lots of times in the movies. Do you think she looks 
like herself?”—“Well, something like herself.”—“I’ve 
heard— ’ ’ 

Mrs. Dusty Hoag watched her with yearning. “Such a 
pretty, pretty thing! Never a sorrow or care in her life, 
I’ll bet. It must be wonderful to be like that.” 

“I’ve been told I looked like that when I was a girl,” 
said Mrs. Weinvoll. “Look at her, Thusy! Ain’t she 
sweet? You know, I’ve heard—” The whispers! Mrs. 
Weinvoll leaned over to impart matters not meant for 
Arethusa’s ears, but which Arethusa could probably under¬ 
stand better than she. 

Old Dawn arose from the sand, dusting himself off. 
“She’s like her picture,” he said to Boosten Claude. 
“Never thought girls were so pretty in the No’th. I don’t 
blame the man who would love her! ’ ’ 

“Something’s changed in her,” said Claude. “When I 
met her in New York she looked like a human icicle. Dif¬ 
ferent now.” 

Deleon leaped up, calling: “Rose! 0 Rose!” 

She looked at him over her shoulder. Deleon left Ma- 
veen without courtesy. Rose smiled at him tolerantly, as 
a mother smiles at a child with well known weaknesses. 
11 1 saw you with that little girl from Milwaukee, 
Gay. Still the same gay Gay, flying about and sucking 
honey! ’ ’ 

Deleon grasped her arm, putting his face close to hers. 
It was a meaningless gesture, unless something was meant. 
The mirthless, unaffectionate smile faded from Rose’s lips. 
Her eyes grew wide. She whispered with terror. 

“Let go of me! Tim is watching! He’s coming this 
way! ’ ’ 

Old Tim heaved his way towards his wife. His face 
was purple. He walked as thunder walks on the sea. 
Half the gala beach watched him, but he did not care. He 
stepped on stomachs. He tripped over knobby knees. 


FAIR MORNING: SAND FRINGES 


183 


“Dileon, you bla’guard! What do ye mane making play 
with my wife?” 

Deleon had been insulted many times before; he had 
learned to bear contumely. “My dear Mr. Grady—” he 
began, in his soft tones. 

“Dear—ye buck! Are ye after-r making fun o’ me? 
Shut up your mouth! I’m plain Tim Grady; but that’s 
better than ye are, hoof or hide or hair! I’ll whack ye 
in the jaw if ye dear me, ye lavender-scented pup! Get 
out! Get out!” 

“The law gives me as much right here as you,” said 
Deleon. 

He spoke unwisely. Nothing exasperates a good Irish¬ 
man more than reference to the law. Old Tim bellowed 
oath to Sathanas or other tribal god. He knotted his 
fists, and Deleon went back. 

“Ye’ll call my wife by her first name, with all the 
warrld to hear! The law gives ye a right—I know the law 
gives ye a right—ye can’t tell me the law gives ye a right! 
The law gives ye a right to breathe, but if I hear breath 
out of ye, I ’ll choke your breath up short! I ’ll break ye 
in my fists! I’ll wr-ring your neck! I’ll smash your 
bones and feed ’em to my dog, if his belly doesn’t tar-rn! 
Run, run, ye sharping swine! Ye scurvy dog!” 

Here indeed was sport for the gods, a rich man’s family 
squabble. Mrs. Weinvoll nearly choked with giggles; 
Mrs. Hoag shook her head and smiled. Yan Chuch puffed 
out his cheeks. Boosten Claude laughed outright. A hun¬ 
dred faces pressed in close circle, as intent as though it 
were a dog fight on the street. 

Beneath the eyes of the watching world Deleon heard a 
rain of insults more fierce and loathsome than he had evei* 
known before. He lost his temper; for an instant he was 
braver than he had ever been. “To Hell with you!” he 
invited. 

Tim’s face was veined with cords of purple. Deleon 
pushed quickly away. 


184 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


4 ‘What a vulgar exhibition !’’ said Mrs. Weinvoll, lifting 
her eyebrows till her face looked like a puckered persim¬ 
mon. “That’s New York society for you.” 

“It just goes to show all people are alike,” said Mrs. 
Hoag. 

“They say he used to work for his living,” said Mrs. 
Weinvoll. “You might know it!” 

Tim turned to his wife. ‘ ‘ Don’t you give me any of your 
nasty looks!” 

All that training, all that pride may give was in the face 
of Rose Dawn, forced to be silent witness, as she had been 
innocent cause, of this scene. All that the scornful may 
know of scorn, all that the stage may know of art. The 
English scorn—scorn of Rollo the Norman, Canute the 
Dane, Hengist the Saxon! Quite a mongrel scorn. But 
how the Irish hate it no tongue, not even that of an Irish¬ 
man, may utter! It is a torch, it is blood, it is black 
murder. 

Old Grady roared. “I’ll tend to ye! Don’t look at me 
that way!” He grew afraid of his own murderous tem¬ 
per, ashamed of the crowds. “This is no place for a 
gintleman! ” he howled, striding away. 

Maveen followed as his long legs carried him down the 
shore. She was furious. She caught up to him and 
grasped his elbow, unable to voice her indignation. “You 

you !” Grady shook her off, advising her to keep her 
mouth shut. She wanted to cry. Her green eyes were 
luminous with strangled anger. 

The shore was strewn with gray kelp, with rotten coco¬ 
nuts and fronds of the coconut palm. Grady stumbled 
over some flotsam barrel staves, cursing as they tangled 
about his legs. His heart was sore. 

A hundred yaids ahead a man and woman were sitting 
in the sand. As Tim and Maveen approached, the man 
arose and passed them. It was the younger Thornwood 
Clay. Old Grady did not know him, but he cursed, for the 
woman Clay had been sitting with was Mrs. Mallow. 


FAIR MORNING: SAND FRINGES 


185 


Alone she sat, waiting for him. Maveen halted, angrier 
than ever. Mrs. Mallow looked up with a pout. Her face 
was stupid; but her full ripe lips might compensate to 
some men for the smallness of her eyes. 

Old Grady bowed ludicrously. “Nancy! All mar-rning 
I have been looking for ye. Sure ’tis the kind fairies have 
led me to ye!” 

Mrs. Mallow lisped. “0, your dreadful, dreadful blar¬ 
ney, Tim, boy!” 

A flame shone in her cheek, but it was rouge. A flame 
in .her little eyes, but no flame of the soul. 

Maveen stared at them contemptuously, and yet with cer¬ 
tain curiosity. Grady’s anger was gone; he caught at the 
air with silly gestures. Mrs. Mallow lilted and pouted and 
squealed. Most stern of judgments was Maveen’s as she 
watched them, the judgment of child on parent. That ye 
be not judged, says the wise man, ye must not—bear off¬ 
spring ! 

Rose shook off the curious throngs, hurrying down again 
into the water. Boosten Claude went with her. Ilis thick 
mane looked like a prickly sea-urchin floating on the 
waves. 

44 If Grady shouts at you like that again, call on me!” 
said -Claude grimly. 44 I’ll not stand for it. We know 
how to treat that sort of thing in the South.” 

Her shoulders shuddered. It may have been the sudden 
water. She breasted an easy roller, trying to swim away 
from him. 

44 Mrs. Mallow didn’t stand it,” said Claude. 44 And a 
jury acquitted her.” 

A high wave dived beneath them, filling Claude’s mouth 
with salt, tossing Rose boisterously. She shook her head 
free from the spume. 44 I’m going to swim out beyond the 
life-lines,” she said. 44 1 love deep water!” 

She went where Claude could not follow. He splut¬ 
tered about in the shallows, watching her sky-blue cap 
bobbing far out till it was lost. 


186 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


XXXVII. DAY OP DOOM: HIGH MORNING: 
MAN WITH GLASSES 

T HE Gold Express has left Jacksonville hours be¬ 
hind it. It has passed Daytona, thundering down 
beside the cloudless tropic sea. Shrilly its 
whistles echo before it. Anthony’s two hands of the watch 
are coming together! 

Dinnis McGinty has Deleon’s big blue racer parked by 
the railroad station. He dozes in the warm sun. His 
round pug nose glistens with pits. Folds of fat lie over 
his belt, for which a rope-length serves. 

Boosten Claude, clad in much rumpled white linen, 
strode up and shook McGinty’s arm. His bush of hair 
was damp with sweat. “Hey, wake up!” he shouted in 
his loud voice. “Isn’t this my car? Isn’t this Deleon’s 
car ?” 

McGinty glowered sleepily. “Git out wi’ ye!” he in¬ 
vited. “Go stick yer eye wit’ a pin. This is me car-r! 
What do ye mane wi’ ye, yerself?” 

“I see his initials here. This belongs to me!” Claude 
hammered the panels. “Get out!” He placed his hands 
on his hips. “Get out, you bum!” 

McGinty unlimbered. In towering rage he clambered 
over the door. “Are ye after-r tr-rying to pick a fight 
with a p’aceful man? Are ye wanting to ir-r-ritate me? 
Stand up! Stand up, small potaties! I want to knock 
ye down! ’ ’ 

He threw his coat to the ground and squared away, mill¬ 
ing his fists. McGinty seemed happy. “Whoop! Who’s 
looking far-r a fight?” Boosten Claude, muttering fero¬ 
cious threats, backed; and turned away. For a pace Mc¬ 
Ginty pursued him, yelling for a fight. Not satisfied, he 
went back to his car, and slept. 

Rumbling and roaring shook the bright steel tracks. 
Dogs barked- Coachmen and chauffeurs began to stir. In 


HIGH MORNING: MAN WITH GLASSES 


187 


squeak of steaming wheels the Gold Express ground in, 
puffing like a runner. 

McGinty awaked and started his motor racing. With 
shouts and waving arms he tried to attract a fare from 
the outpouring hundreds of passengers. One man came 
towards him, hesitatingly, looking at McGinty curiously 
through deep amber glasses. He wore a hat pulled far 
down over reddish hair, whose dry lusterlessness made it 
seem false. 

“Here ye are, Doctor! R’yal Poinsettia? Two dollars 
to take ye there.” 

The man with amber glasses tossed his bags into the blue 
car’s tonneau. He sat down where he could study Mc¬ 
Ginty. “You spotted me,” he said drily. “Trust a 
chauffeur. ’ ’ 

“I always know what a man is,” McGinty boasted. 
“Niver made a mistake in me life. And I always rimimber 

them. I got a head for faces. ” 

“You’ve got a good head for your own face,” said the 
man with amber glasses. “Not the Poinsettia. Take me 
to some quiet boarding-house. Steady ! ” 

“Now, ye have the app’arance o’ a man I might ha’ 
known,’’ said McGinty. “Ye were on the Far-rce ? Belike 
we had a drap o’ the stuff togither in New York?” 

The man with glasses didn’t think so. He seemed un¬ 
easy. McGinty raced his car furiously through the most 
crowded part of town for, though the boarding-house he 
had in mind lay close to the railroad, he wanted to earn his 
two dollars. The divinity of drink alone kept him from 
collision. 

“Whose car is this?” the man with glasses asked. I 
see the initials G. D. on the door. Now, that might be 
Grady-Dawn.” 

“Ah, ye know old Tim Grady?” 

“Everyone’s heard of Mr. Grady,” said the man with 

glasses. . . 

< ‘ The curse o ’ Hell upon ’im! I know him well. 


188 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“So it seems.’* 

“Listen, ye Doctor!” McGinty cut across traffic and 
halted at a curbing. They were on Biscayne’s largest 
avenue. Dinnis drew out a flat bottle, uncorking it with 
his teeth. “I know a thing! I could tell ye— Hark! 
Niver to soul befar-r have I br’athed it! In Car-rk these 
far-rty years ago—hark ye! ” 

“Drive on!” said the man impatiently, uneasy at the 
crowds. 

“Ah, but me fri’nd!” McGinty twisted around and 
strove to grasp the man’s lapels. He tendered the bottle. 
“Take a swig to auld Tim Grady—may he be damned! 
’Tis Bimini liquor, Doctor, and ’twill set well wi’ 
ye!” 

But the man with amber glasses refused. McGinty 
drove him around by the bay, and back to that little frame 
house near the railroad where Deleon had quarters. Din¬ 
nis introduced him to the landlady, a frayed, discouraged 
spirit. 

“ ’Tis me gr-reat fri’nd, the Doctor. Doctor—?” 

“Dr. Dichter.” 

“ ’Tis me fri’nd, the Dichter Doctor. Trate him well!” 

The man with amber glasses took an attic room next to 
Gay Deleon. 

Rose and Maveen had been on the street when Dinnis 
McGinty halted with his invitation to drink. Only a glance 
the two women had; crowds and moving vehicles came be¬ 
tween. 

“That looked a little like Padriac!” Maveen said. 

Rose was tottering. Maveen led her into a drugstore, 
forcing her to a seat. “Rose! Rose! Your hands are so 
hot! So hot! 0, you’ve got the fever, Rose!” 
Rose Dawn shivered in an ague, her hands before her 
eyes. 

“It’s this hot sun,” Maveen said nervously. “I ought 
to get hold of father. But I don’t know where to find 
him. He’s probably with Mrs. Mallow.” 


FULL NOON: GHOST OF JOHN DAWN 


189 


XXXYIII. DAY OF DOOM: FULL NOON: GHOST 

OF JOHN DAWN 

L AURENCE watched from the golf-club veranda 
Maveen alone on the last green. Sandy level links 
they were, free of all natural hazards save the 
ocean. On one side Bay Mimayne, pale lilac; on the other 
the sea, blue and purple. 

Mrs. Weinvoll sat at a far end of the veranda, Bunnie 
Hoag with her. Bunnie kicked her little heels against her 
chair-rungs, desperately wishing Larry would notice her. 
Mrs. Weinvoll read “Society Scandals,” looking for her 
name. Her name was not there, since she was unfortu¬ 
nately neither in society nor scandalous. Maveen waved 
greeting to Laurence. Her bright hair flamed against a 
background of green. The air dozed; the ocean was still. 

Thornwood Clay dropped to a squeaky rocker beside 
Laurence. “Not a bad looking girl,” he said. “I noticed 
her on the beach this morning.” 

Maveen jiggled the ball into the cup. Madly as she had 
pursued it over dusty fields, she was now indifferent to 
its fate. She left it to sprout or rot. Laurence introduced 
the daughter of Tim Grady to the son of Thornwood Clay. 

Maveen did not associate him with that old man she had 
seen her father kick out of Dawnrose. “Rather fast look¬ 
ing, Larry,” Maveen said, when Clay murmured a banality 
and left. She puffed a cigaret. “He might be amusing. 
I like the older men.” 

“0, Clay’s been around,” Laurence said sulkily. 
“We’ve all been around.” 

“You haven’t any business making friends with the fast 
crowd,” Maveen said sharply. “You’re not that sort.” 

Her tone was proprietory. Laurence was satisfied; he 
was not a man to hate petticoat strings. Men who do hate 
them, the Deleons, Urban Wiggses, Higgleson Todds, An- 
thonys, walk with spiked heels on women’s hearts. Soft 


190 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


tears are set to snare them, unavailingly. Laurence was 
satisfied. 

He caught her hand. “I’m really not so wild, Maveen,” 
he said; a truth quite apparent. Mrs. Weinvoll watched 
with a knowing smile. Youth will be served, and also ob¬ 
served. Little Bunnie Hoag kicked her chair-rungs. 

“0 Spencer! A word with you, please, Spencer!” Gay 
Deleon was calling. He stood a rod away, motioning. 
“It’s important, Spencer!” 

Deleon appeared unhappy. That was strange, since he 
was handsome enough in his soft fashion, since he was 
young, and since (if his sporting toggery was evidence) he 
enjoyed vast wealth. What more does anyone need to be 
happy ? 

Laurence met Deleon impatiently; for a thousand reasons 
he disliked the gambler. Deleon led him out of Maveen’s 
hearing, scrutinizing him keenly, reading him well. Lau¬ 
rence suspected something connected with Maveen. 

“Spencer,” said Deleon, not letting his eyes drop from 
Laurence’s candid face, “I was to receive a check for a 
thousand this morning.” He paused. 

“You can spend it very quickly in Biscayne.” 

“But it didn’t come. It will surely be here tomorrow 
morning. ’ ’ 

“Quite nice,” murmured Laurence, blinking his blue 
eyes. He wondered if Deleon was contemplating buy¬ 
ing him off from Maveen, and pondered just where he 
could hit Deleon with a blow which would stun and not 
kill. 

“Well, Spencer,” Deleon said uneasily. “I’m just a 
little cramped for cash.” Laurence nodded. “Cramped 
as the devil for ready cash! For dinner this evening, you 
know.” Laurence nodded again. “And the evening 
paper, and so on.” 

Laurence was puzzled. “I read the papers, too,” said 
he. 

Deleon hadn’t eaten anything but sardines for a week; 


FULL NOON: GHOST OF JOHN DAWN 


191 


he was hardly in control of himself. But still the gallant 
front, the poker face ! “I'd like to borrow some money!’’ 
he said at last, seeing Laurence still didn’t understand. 

“Surely! Glad! Got all that filthy stuff I won in 
Clay’s room. How’s a hundred?” Laurence tumbled 
over himself in eagerness. He was embarrassed as if he 
were the beggar; he tried to cover up the transaction from 
Maveen. “Anything I’ve got. It must be like the devil 
to have to ask for money.” 

“0, I don’t mind,” said Deleon truthfully. Thought of 
money was wine in his blood. “I got into a game the 
other night, Spencer; and I swear to you on my word and 
honor I dropped over two thousand!” Laurence nodded, 
not caring for Deleon’s word or honor. “That’s why I’m 
cramped. I’m no child with the cards, Spencer. My 
luck has got to turn. It will turn! I’ll pay you in the 
morning, Spencer, without fail, so help me—” 

Laurence didn’t want any man to perjure his soul for a 
hundred dollars. “You’ve given your word. It’s be¬ 
tween gentlemen,” he said. Deleon’s insistence had 
brought up doubts. But he was generous, with youth’s in¬ 
difference. Deleon pocketed the bills. 

“A word of advice, Deleon. May I?” 

“Glad to hear it, Mr. Spencer.” Deleon would take 

advice with money. 

“It may be worth more than that hundred: Marry that 
little Weinvoll girl, or marry a lamp-post if it’s got a 
million!” Laurence grew ashamed as soon as the words 
were out. “You called me a fortune hunter once,” he 

said. 

He was afraid Deleon would throw the money back m 
his face. But he didn’t know his Deleon. Thanks, 
Spencer! Thanks ! IT1 think it over. 

Deleon shook Laurence’s limp hand. Laurence walked 

away, feeling dirty. 

McGinty drove Deleon back to his hot little attic room. 
Pete Lopez, cowering in a closet, knew Deleon brought 


192 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


good news when he heard Deleon running up the stairs. 
He crawled out like a snake, his bright eyes glittering. 

“ I’m flush, Pete ! I fished for a sucker, and caught that 
half-witted Spencer. Here’s your half. I hope to Hell 
you clear out now!” 

“Not so loud, Gay. These walls are thin. Someone will 
hear. ’ ’ 

Pete was not so carefree and merry as usual. His brown 
face was strained; his uncombed mustache draggled over 
lips that quivered. Six hours in Deleon’s hot attic, behind 
the bureau or beneath the cot, had dulled all sparkle in 
him. And he loathed sardines. He yapped disagreeably, 
nerves on edge. 

“What’s the matter, Pete? Afraid of ghosts?” 

Pete muttered, puckering his nose. 

“I got this, when all you got was jail!” Deleon jeered. 
“You didn’t know how to go about holding Spencer up. 
When are you going to clear out ? ’ ’ 

“Sick of seeing me around, are you?” 

“I’ve got troubles enough of my own.” 

“This old Dawn isn’t like any hick cop I ever ran into 
before,” Lopez muttered. “You’d know he was Johnny 
Dawn’s old man, a fierce fighter and a good hater. Damn 
the pack of ’em ! He’s got eyes everywhere. McGinty has 
a boat to take me to Malimus Isle; but how can I break 
clear ? Not so loud, Gay! I hope some day they hunt you, 
and you’ll think of me, Gay Deleon!” 

“All right, all right, Pete! Shoot off your mouth some 
other time. What are you going to do now ? ’ ’ 

“I’m going to lie low till old Dawn forgets me. Why 
don’t you do something yourself? Why don’t you get 
money from old Grady on what McGinty says?” 

Deleon shivered. “He’d strangle me, even if it’s the 
truth. ’ ’ 

“More likely than ever if it is the truth,” said Lopez, 
cheering. “Go at it through Rose. She always had a 
tender heart. Bleed her. Bleed him. Tell her Scotland 


FULL NOON: GHOST OF JOHN DAWN 


193 


Yard is after him. She doesn’t love the old man, but it 
wouldn’t be nice to watch him hang!” 

“Get money from him yourself. He always carries a 
few loose hundreds.” 

Pete bit his fingernails. ‘‘Would you marry Rose, Gay, 
he asked slowly, “if you could?” 

Deleon walked up and down. “I’d ha’ done it when 
we got John Dawn out of the way,” he muttered, “since I 
couldn’t have her any other way. But what chance had I? 
You know, Pete, that fool girl is still crazy about John 
Dawn! ’ ’ 

Up and down Deleon walked. He came to a halt by the 
little attic window. Resting his elbows on the ledge, he 
stared out at the sky. 

Pete was still buried in gloomy thought. He started up 
with a groan. “Be still, Gay!” Yet Deleon had said 
nothing. ‘ ‘ Be still! ” 

Between Deleon’s room and the next was a wall of pine- 
wood no thicker than paper. Beyond it someone was 
walking up and down. 

“What’s wrong with you, Pete? No one’s listening t© 
us.” 

“Listen to that step, Gay!” 

‘ ‘ I hear it. ’ ’ 

“Before my God! It's the step of John Dawn!” 


XXXIX. DAY OF DOOM: SIESTA HOUR: DEAD 

DREAMS 

I N his wide cabin facing the Thorn's afterdeck old Tim 
Grady is taking afternoon siesta. The door is locked 
from within. The two plate-glass windows are still 
nailed down, as van Chuch had them nailed down for old 
Tim’s confinement on the high seas. One round porthole 
above old Tim Grady’s face lets in a shaft of light no big¬ 
ger than a man’s right arm. 



194 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


He sleeps. And sleeping, come dreams to old Tim 
Grady. 

He lies on his back. He gasps like a whale. His limbs 
are sprawled out wide, one hand dangling to the floor. 
His mottled gray hair is rumpled to a peak. His blue and 
white flannels smell of spilled sherry. His red face glistens 
with oil and heat. 

A lazy summering fly hums through the porthole. As 
other insects to brighter flames, it is drawn irresistibly to¬ 
wards old Grady’s lambent nose. There it squats. There 
it thinks. There it surveys the world calmly, waving its 
wings in thin song, looking for other worlds to conquer. 
Hopping on six prickly legs, it washes its little face. Phil¬ 
osophically it ponders on the mystery of the opened mouth 
beneath. Grady sneezes. The fly is blasted away. 

With a fling of his arm old Tim struck outward. He 
dreamed that a galloping goblin with six pink eyes was 
munching on his nose. His outflying arm struck a shelf 
above his head, knocking down a skelter of books and writ¬ 
ing things. Fell a flutter of paper; Tim dreamed he lay 
in *the woods while robins covered him with leaves. Fell 
pens, pencils, scissors and a blotter; Tim dreamed he was 
the circus lady at whom the wild-man throws knives. Fell 
the dictionary; old Tim knew that he was dead. 

Fell a bottle of ink. Half-arousing, old Tim wiped the 
iron-smelling stuff from his face. He sneezed, and fell 
back again. He was heavy with sleep and drink. He 
dreamed of the drowning seas. 

Sleeping, thus came the dead dreams to old Tim Grady!— 

He is in a dark room smelling of sod. He drinks potato 
whisky. Come foul faces. Comes a cry. A dead man 
lies upon the earth with the red moon in his eyes. And 
even now, as Grady watches, the dead man stands and 
speaks (as no dead man ever did). “ ’Tis a bloody, bloody 
moon!” the dead man cries. “I feared for it!” 

Thus this dream passes. Old Grady whispers. 

And old Thornwood Clay stands before him, saying: 


SIESTA HOUR: DEAD DREAMS 


195 


“Ye are no gintleman!” “ Ye lie! Ye lie!” cries old Tim 
Grady in his dream. But his voice is empty as the wind, 
and old Clay mocks him with low faces. He grapples 
breast to breast with old Thornwood Clay, striving to cast 
him down a cliff. “L’ave me alone!” cries Thornwood 
Clay. “Far-r I am dead, am dead!” 

Thus this dream passes. 

And Rose Dawn lies on a bed of gold, weaving and wind¬ 
ing her hair. Above her head flashes a sign, now white, 
now dark; “Sin” in ten thousand lights. A wavering 
host of men kneel about her, whose faces change even as 
shadows. Deleon, Todd, Arsen, Spencer, Ike—they pass. 
One dreadful shape has come to take their place. 0 shape 
of death! A man who sits upon a horse, with hat far back 
on long black hair, with fierce eyes shining. “Ye stole 
her from me, old Tim Grady! Ye stole her from the 
dead ! ’ ’ Rose Dawn vanishes, and a death-white witch lies 
in her place, drowsing on bed of gold. A skeleton presses 
kisses to her death-white lips, and his bones are wet with 
the.sea. 

Thus this dream passes. Old Tim Grady whispers. 

And Tom Jefferson kneels while Grady whips the lash. 
“Take that! And that, ye dog! For I am Imperor, and 
I have bought ye!” But Tom leaps up, smothering him 
in python coils, and high above the ocean hangs his soul. 
“0 ye! Ye loud ignorant white man! Ye fool, to death! 
I am the black king! ’ ’ Through swart abysses falls his 
soul, and goblins scream at him. 

Thus this dream passes. 

And comes a blood red moon with but a single eye. It 
walks, and Grady screams, for not before has man or ghost 
seen a single eye which walks! “ ’Tis a bloody, bloody 
moon! I fear for it! ” Again he screams. Again. 

And screaming, thus passed the dreams from old Tim 
Grady. He awoke. 

Maveen was sitting on the Thorn’s deck. She hammered 
on her father’s door at sound of that hoarse, bellowing cry. 



196 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Black Tom came leaping down the decks. He shook the 
door-frame with shoulder blows. 

Old Tim fumbled at the lock and sprawled forth, blink¬ 
ing at the high sunlight, tasting vinegar in his mouth. 
“What are ye after-r prowling about my door?” he gasped 
to Tom. “Where is it? Where is’t?” 

“Where is what?” Maveen asked indignantly. 

“The moon! The bloody moon!” 

“Great Heavens!” mocked Maveen. “Are you asking 
for an orange?” 

Old Tim was coming to himself. He blinked about. 
Waves danced merrily around the Thorn. Palms rippled 
on the shore. Hot and fragrant rose the odor of drowsy 
flowers. Voices of laughter sounded far away. 

“A fine girl ye are,” he snarled, “ye colleen bawn! No 
rispict for your father’s gray hairs. What do ye care if 
I’m murdered in my sleep? Didn’t ye hear-r me call?” 

“Not a sound,” sneered Maveen. “Who; murdered 
you ?’ ’ 

“None o’ your lip ! Shut your mouth when I’m talking! 
I was lying on my bed—I couldn’t lift a hand—I couldn’t 
yell—” 

“Of course not. Couldn’t even whisper!” 

Old Tim would have liked to smite her dead with his 
fist. But he didn’t touch her. He was a gentleman, and a 
gentleman never smacks a lady unless he is drunk. 

“I dreamed—” 

“Are you an old woman, Tim Grady, to have hysteria 
over a dream?” 

Tom Jefferson entered his master’s stateroom to set 
back the fallen books and scattered writing things. Mrs. 
Higgs, sans lip-stick, rouge, eyebrow-pencil, whitewash, 
face cement, and all things which make women what they 
are, stuck her head from her door and scowled. 

But Rose Dawn, drowsing in blue silk, a creature of pink 
and gold, beautiful as the Shulamite, did not once awaken 
from deep sleep. 


DEPARTING SUN: MRS. MALLOW’S HATE 1197 


XL. DAY OP DOOM: DEPARTING SUN: MRS. 

MALLOW’S HATE 

O LD Timothy Grady was in furious anger with all 
which is. He stamped around the four-square 
veranda of the Royal Poinsettia, growling and 
shaking his shoulders. He passed the chair of Maveen 
with a louder growl and more vicious shake. A man with 
amber spectacles nearly bumped into him at the turn of a 
corner. 

“What do ye mane by slamming into me?” old Tim 
yelled. “Haven’t ye got eyes? Get out o’ my way!” 

The man was smaller than old Grady, hence arose 
Grady’s courage. He had never seen a man so big as him¬ 
self except black Tom. The man passed silently on. 

“That’s right! That’s right! Ye’d better!” Tim 
growled after him. He continued grumbling and threaten¬ 
ing for half an hour. Mrs. Hoag was terrified to hear him 
mutter as he passed, striking out at the air: “Don’t you 
bump me, four-eyes! I’ll learn ye to be a gintleman!’ 
Mrs. Hoag shivered. “I’ll learn ye to be a gintleman!” 
promised old Grady, striding on. . 

Maveen watched Laurence playing tennis with little 
Bunnie Hoag on courts in front of the veranda. Little 
Bunnie was all in crimson. “0 Larry!” Maveen cried. 
Laurence turned, and a hard driven ball plunked into his 
stomach. He waved his racket, and resumed his game 
with a stifled curse. Petticoat rule galls at times even 
the pinkest-cheeked of men. 

Out of a long blue racer hopped Mrs. Mallow. “0 dearie 
me!” she gasped prettily. “I’ve lost my change. Wait 
for me, will you please, McGinty?” She puckered her 
small eyes and made a sweet mouth at him. McGinty spat. 

Mrs. Mallow tripped merrily up the steps to the veranda, 
her rounded shape seemingly filled with gas bags which 
ballooned her. With a dainty smile she nodded to Maveen, 


198 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


who completely ignored her. Green frost was in Maveen’s 
glance, and she puffed nastily on a cigaret. Mrs. Mallow 
was not disconcerted. She drew a chair up close to Ma¬ 
veen and plumped down in it. In crocodile calm she 
waited for something to drift along in which to close 
her teeth. She basked and sunned. Her small eyes 
closed. 

“Have you seen any of my dear boys?” No answer 
from Maveen. “Dear old Colonel Dawn is quite heart¬ 
broken. He says your father has cut him out with me.” 
No answer. “And Mr. Boosten Claude swears he’ll shoot 
himself with one of those dreadful, dreadful guns he car¬ 
ries.” No answer. “He calls them gats. Isn’t that just 
too perfectly droll ? ” No answer. 

Mrs. Mallow began to lisp. “That young Spencer boy 
is rather nice, isn’t he? He’s raving crazy in love with 
me. Why, do you know, my dear, that the very first night 
I met him—up in Thorn Clay’s room it was, before you 
came to Biscayne—he fell down on his knees and actually 
wept as he begged me to marry him.” 

No answer from Maveen. She tore a cigaret to shreds. 

“But I don’t suppose I ought to feel pleased, even if he 
did take me home that night and stay to a dreadful, dread¬ 
ful hour. He’s such a flirt. He’s told me that any girl 
would fall in love with him. That’s the reason I wouldn’t 
marry him.” 

Mrs. Mallow paused. ‘ ‘ Shut your mouth! ’ ’ said Maveen. 
Mrs. Mallow did. 

Old Tim, pacing round the veranda, saw his wife coming 
towards him, Boosten Claude with her. Mr. Claude was 
not so tall as Rose, even including his bushy hair, and he 
walked along on tiptoes, smiling up. His white crash suit 
was fearfully wrinkled; one trouser leg had caught and was 
bunched about his knee, disclosing a somewhat soiled white 
sock and a purple garter. Rose was in gingham pink as 
her name. 


DEPARTING SUN: MRS. MALLOW’S HATE 


199 


“I’m going to organize a Suicide Club for you, Rose 
Dawn,” said Boosten Claude, with true Southern gallantry. 

Rose liked admiration, but Boosten Claude wearied her. 
He was so dreadfully conscious that he must be gallant, 
had the traditions of the South on his thin shoulders. He 
took love seriously, as he took liquor. 

“Go as far as you like,” she said. 

Mr. Claude was muffed. He did not know whether she 
had given him permission to form his club, or to suicide. 

The light of battle shone before old Tim Grady as he ad¬ 
vanced. His nostrils sniffed war. He snarled and foamed 
and chewed the cud of his anger. He would have pre¬ 
ferred to lash into Deleon, but Boosten Claude would do. 
Mad men cannot always choose. 

“What are you doing with my wife!” he howled. 

The two were first aware of him with these words. 
Claude stood with his hands on his hips, rocking up and 
down. His brows met. He thrust out his neck. 

“I’m talking with your wife!” he howled, just as loudly. 

Old Tim made unintelligible passes. He had expected 
Claude to turn tail and run, for Claude was about the 
smallest man he had ever seen. Boosten Claude stepped 
forward three inches. 

“And I’m walking with your wife!” he howled. He 
stepped forward another three inches. “What are you go¬ 
ing to do about it! ” 

He was now treading on Grady’s toes. His chin rested 
on Grady’s bosom. His hair brushed Grady’s nose. 

Tim drew back. Claude’s hands were on hips, and those 
hips bulged. “You ought to be shot!” yelped Claude. 
“If I were your wife I’d shoot you! Clear out of here 
before I remember I’m a Southerner! Pardon me, Mrs. 
Grady, this is my affair. Now, I’m tired of hearing you 
yell around here, Grady! I’m on to you! Just you dare 
to hit me! Just you dare—you dare!” 

Grady did not dare. Boosten Claude took another step, 


200 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


and Grady was forced back. Cursing Cromwell and the 
English, Tim turned and stamped away. He tried to 
break the planks of the veranda; his soles ached, so heavily 

he stamped. 

Claude turned to Rose. “Do you like kumquats? he 

asked, in a soft, beseeching voice. 

Rose could think of nothing to say, “Your garter is 

showing,” she told him. 

Grady thundered around the corner of the veranda. He 
saw Maveen sitting with Mrs. Mallow. Laurence Spencer 
was wandering up, wiping his forehead. 

Grady thrust the big young man out of the way. He 
was blind with passion, and took no notice of Mrs. Mal¬ 
low’s simpering greeting. “Have you been talking to this 
woman?” he asked Maveen directly. 

As he had hoped, Maveen was at once as furiously angry. 

‘ 1 Who are you talking to ? ” 

“I’m talking to you! I want to know if you have been 
associating with this woman!” He waved his hand at 
Mrs. Mallow, a gesture which only escaped being a slap. 
“It is my business. You shut up when I’m talking. She 
isn’t fit for you to associate with. Do you hear me? 

“Dear Tim!” cried Mrs. Mallow. 

“Now, you listen to me!” said Grady, waving his finger 
at Maveen. “I won’t stand for you making a show of 
yourself with any female like this. You’re making your¬ 
self disriputable—” 

“ I’m of age, ’ ’ snapped Maveen. “ I do as I please. My 
affairs are my own.” 

Old Tim panted for words. He wanted a fight. “All 
right, all right!” he yelled, unable to think of anything 
more witty. “Your affair-rs are your own. But your 
money ain’t.” 

Maveen walked away with Laurence. Tim was partially 
satisfied in having the last word. “Don’t let me see you 
making a disgrace of yourself again!” he bellowed. 

Maveen was shaking with passion. “This is the last 


DEPARTING SUN: MRS. MALLOW’S HATE 


201 


time,” she said ominously, as Spencer led her away. “I’ve 
sworn it. I’m not going to be disgraced again like this.” 

“What do you propose doing?” asked Laurence. 

It was ungallant. Worse, it was unwise. Wise men do 
not consult oracles, look for a reason in the thunderclouds, 
nor ask purposes of an angry woman. 

“Don’t worry about me. I can look out for myself, 
Mr. Spencer.” 

Coldly she spoke. Laurence realized he had missed an 
incomparable opportunity of proffering his life and devo¬ 
tion. Perhaps he had not wished to. If he had, there 
would be other opportunities. Maveen would see to that. 
Missing incomparable opportunities is a prerogative of 
young men. 

Mrs. Mallow had dropped her simpering mask. Her 
small eyes were hard, and she puffed. “What is the mat¬ 
ter with you, Tim Grady?” she asked, without a trace of 
coquetry. “Are you looking for trouble?” 

“Maybe ye think ye can supply it for me?” 

“If that’s what you’re after, I can, and a plenty! So 
you’re tired of me, are you? Been making fun of me, 
have you ? Think you can call me names to all the world, 
do you? You’re sick of me, are you?” 

< ‘ I was sick of ye the first time I iver laid eyes on ye! ” 
screeched Tim. “For God’s sake, hide that face!” 

Mrs. Mallow drew in her shoulders. “ I ’ll pay you back 
for this, you dirty old mick!” she hissed, as no lady should. 

Quivering till her bustle shook, darting poisoned glances 
about her, squinting her beady eyes, Mrs. Mallow sailed 
down the steps and across the sward. Watching her as 
she flounced into a blue car, old Tim was stricken with 
a sickly fear. Ah, they were bad dreams he had these 
latter days! The chauffeur of the blue car was Dinnis 
McGinty. 

Grady cursed. He shook his head, but could not shake 
away the vision. Fear, with wretched, wretched fingers, 
cowered up to stifle him! 


202 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


XLI. DAY OF DOOM: SEVEN THAT NIGHT: 

NAME OF THE DEAD! 

tiT FOUGHT the fish five hours,’’ narrated old 
Colonel Dawn. “Seven feet from spike to tail. 

M The biggest sail-fish that ever sailed the Gulf 
Stream! Now—” 

‘ ‘ My gr-reat grandfather, Terence Rory Grady, who was 
lord mayor of Bally by Donegal Water,” old Tim Grady 
broke in, “hooked a squid once weighed far-rteen stone.” 

All other voices hushed when Grady roared. Not much 
else they could do. And then Grady was a very rich man, 
and his words on anything were important. 

A dozen or more men sat in the Deepsea Club of Bis- 
cayne. The room was foggy with smoke; old Tim was 
foggy with drink. He had swilled largely that day, for 
liquor fortifies the heart. Liquor is HColian, bringing 
soft winds or storms. Yet beneath all that loud blustering 
induced by drink, Tim Grady was afraid. His heart rat¬ 
tled. He wanted the companionship of many men. A 
dozen men, a dozen living hearts about him. Nothing 
could harm him here! 

Old Tim was at his best. Not better had he ever seemed 
in life. Not better would he seem again. 0 drunken hour! 

He was the strong man now, his tones like clashing 
swords. He was the merry man now, laughing boister¬ 
ously. He was the boon man now, slapping the knees of his 
neighbors. He was the judicious man now, narrating the 
oracles. 

His reddish face, his hooked nose, his strong jaws, ap¬ 
peared softened in the hazy smoke. More cherubically 
pink his visage now than satanically red. His hair seemed 
darker. He sucked a cigar, and roared. 

His glances fell upon the old Colonel, upon Boosten 
Claude, Laurence Spencer, even Deleon, Thornwood Clay, 
whom he did not know, with equal favor. He did not mind 



SEVEN THAT NIGHT 


203 


the presence of Peter van Chuch who sat, his hard jaws 
working, out there near the shadows. In the utmost shad¬ 
ows was a man with amber glasses. No one could tell at 
whom he looked. Tim Grady passed his glance over the 
man with amber glasses. His face brought up neither 
memories nor fears. No vision surely, as the shadows 
deepened, of the bitter face of fate! 

“One thing,” said old Tim Grady. He proceeded to 
tell a dozen things, each one of which was a lie. He was 
not contradicted. Mighty in the mouth are the words of 
a rich man when he talks of anything, and many are they 
who harken. 

Grady talked. He touched on everything from politics 
to poetry. He waved his cigar. He handled a glass. 
He talked of all things with vehemence and wit, for he 
was an Irishman, to whom all things are vehement and 
witty. 

Old Professor Schermerhorn, a retired college president 
with six hairs on his chin, listened reverently to Grady’s 
exposition of international politics; although old Scher¬ 
merhorn had spent fifty years of his life on that one sub¬ 
ject, and come to the conclusion that no one knew anything 
about it. He did not so much as bat an eye, if professors 
are ever addicted to that vice. Grady talked of art, and a 
painter harkened. He talked of college; Laurence Spencer 
harkened. He talked of the sea; van Chuch harkened. He 
talked of war, and a soldier harkened. 

“I’m for prohibition, gintlemen!” shouted old Tim 
Grady, banging down his glass. “I’d like to have you 
gintlemen come to my ship sometime,” he added paren¬ 
thetically. “I’ll show ye hosth-pitality.” 

Grady told of good men ruined by beer. . . . He swore 
it was the working man’s destruction; although a small 
amount of whisky, before or after dinner, never harmed a 
gentleman. His audience approved with murmurs. Old 
Schermerhorn thrust out his scraggly beard with the sug¬ 
gestion that college students might be added to working 


204 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


men in the ranks of those whom drink had ruined. Hav¬ 
ing piped, he settled back with many knowing little nods. 

“R-right ye are!” boomed old Tim. “Ye can bet I 
niver let my boy Paddy take a drop. And a soberer, 
harder working boy ye couldn’t find in a month o’ Sun¬ 
days ! Niver got in a scr-rape of any kind. Niver turned 
a card, niver was mixed up wi’ a woman, niver smoked, 
niver— ’’ 

11 What does he do for a living ? ’ 9 asked the old Colonel. 

“Speaking of prohibition, gintlemen, reminds me of the 
women,” said old Grady. 

Then he was off. He was on sure ground here, with a 
subject which always interested him. There was a nodding 
of heads when old Tim said women are a great deal less 
intelligent than men; the same assent when old Tim said 
they are a great deal more intelligent than men. It is a 
poor Irishman who can’t argue both sides of a question, 
and both wrong. No one denied him either proposition, 
which irritated old Tim. After usquebaugh, and after 
women, he most dearly loved a fight. 

“Ah,” said he, growing reminiscent. “I knew a girl, 
as honest a looking girl as ye might care to wed — 99 He 
drank, wiping his lips. “Gintlemen, that girl comes from 
the very highest society in New Yor-rk city, and I will not 
say her name, but she goes in much for ar-rt. They call 
her the Ar-rty Girl. Ye’d niver guess—” 

Many men smirked, Deleon most dazzlingly of all. Old 
Grady recounted things which some men keep dark. It 
was only the dangerous eyes of Boosten Claude, I think, 
which kept him from speaking of his wife. It would not 
have shamed him. Ribald laughter struck Grady’s ears 
pleasantly. Old Professor Schermerhorn, like a shrill pic¬ 
colo in an orchestra, piped his senile cackles. 

Argument feeds on opposition, wit on concord. Grady 
grew intimate, almost affectionate. He chewed his cigar 
and flung it to the floor. His arms waved out. He tapped 
Colonel Dawn intimately on the knee. 


SEVEN THAT NIGHT 


205 


Many men were stirred by that intimacy with a rich man, 
many men perhaps as rich as old Tim Grady. The riches 
of another man seem more powerful than our own. At 
the end, when life’s good things are weighed, the blessings 
counted, the honors polished, it may be not the least of 
them will be to say, in the Wigley Arsen manner: ‘‘As 
my intimate friend Tim Grady once remarked, while we 
were chatting together—” 

“Ah, but speaking of women, there’s Nancy Mallow,” 
said old Tim Grady. “Did ye iver hear, gintleman, about 
her and Higgleson Todd? Wait. ’Twas this way. No 
one knows the straight o’ it but me. Todd definded her, 
ye know, at the trial. ’Twas Wiggs should have done it. 
He ate—ha, ha!—he ate an oyster—ha, ha!—” 

Old Tim Grady was roaring with such laughter he could 
not go on. He had never been so happy. He drank and 
sputtered, still laughing. 

Thornwood Clay arose. Colonel Dawn called to him: 
“This promises to be good. Something for the Suicide 
Club. Wait a moment, Thornwood Clay!” 

Old Tim gagged. He wilted. His hazy eyes stared 
about him in the smoke. “What did you sayf” he 
screamed. 

“Told Thornwood Clay to wait a moment.” 

“O God! 0 God!” Tim Grady gasped. And dropped 
to the floor. 


XLII. DAY OF DOOM: NINE THAT NIGHT: 
THE WHISPERED WORD 

T IM GRADY was drunk, still drunk. Perhaps 
drunker. The dancers, dancing to barbaric music 
in the ballroom and on the verandas of the Royal 
Poinsettia, laughed at him. The Irish bull is a goat when 
drunk. 

Hopping about, shaking his arms, he grabbed one part- 


206 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


ner and then another, in the fashion of a barn dance. He 
danced with Mrs. Weinvoll (an epochal day in the annals 
of Milwaukee!); grabbed up from a chair Mrs. Dusty 
Hoag, who did not dance, and whirled her; took Arethusa 
fiom the arms of Deleon, Bunnie from the arms of Lau¬ 
rence Spencer; offered to dance with Mrs. Higgs; tried 

to dance with his own wife, though that is always bad 
form. 

He tripped over Boosten Claude, knocking him down and 
kicking him. Then he apologized. In his right mind Tim 
Grady would have apologized to no man. 

Out on the veranda, morose and alone, sat Mrs. Mallow, 
mad as a slavering dog. Near her sat a man with amber 
glasses. Clay bent over Mrs. Mallow and whispered. She 
nodded. Clay walked around the veranda. 

Rose Grady watched her husband continually as she 
danced with Laurence Spencer. She was not amused by 
Laurence s formal Harvard airs, and the awkwardness of 
his stiff left arm was a continual irritation to her. 

You ’re too much like your father,” she said. 41 Medical 

men are stupid. Take me back to the Thorn. I’m tired 
of this.” 

Deleon was looking at her over the head of little Are¬ 
thusa Weinvoll. He stumbled, and missed for a moment 
the amorous nothings he whispered into Arethusa’s all too 
attentive ears. Her freckled little nose was uptilted; her 
milk-white arms clung very closely to his dapper sleeve. 
Deleon’s tongue was always deft with women, and Are¬ 
thusa was unskilled. He pressed her white and silver 
bodice, felt the beating of her heart. 

Rose moved towards the door, dragging Laurence with 
her out of the swirl of the dance. Mrs. Higgs, who had 
been ^putting on exorbitant airs to awe Mrs. Hoag, saw 
Rose’s movement, and followed. Not one man, blind be¬ 
sotted with drink, with age, or with satiety though he might 
be, but watched Rose with both his eyes. No one but Tim 


NINE THAT NIGHT 


207 


Grady, who was easting his unholy eyes upon little Bunnie 
Hoag. 

“I’m tired of it all, Laurence/’ Rose said. “0, I’m 
sick of all the light, and the stares, and Tim’s noise. Take 
me home!” 

Her blue eyes, clear and deceitfully shallow as the deep¬ 
est tropic waters, looked up at him. A faint weariness and 
unutterable wisdom were in that look. Laurence Spencer 
was reminded, seeing her golden curls, of fierce sunlight on 
blue sea. For the time he lost all thought of childish little 
Bunnie Hoag and foolish Maveen Grady. 

The music ceased. The verberant drums rolled away. 
The violins were on the wind. The dancers broke up 
and drifted away, and many a heart was parted. It 
seemed that music ceased because Rose Dawn had left 
them. 

Thornwood Clay walked slowly around the great ve¬ 
randa, looking down at the bushes. He came to a place 
where motorcars were parked. Dim headlights gleamed in 
a mist of frustrate tears. 

For a few moments, leaning over the veranda railing, 
Clay watched a man below him. Glumly squatted on his 
haunches, this fellow groaned and wheezed as he tossed a 
knife. From his knees, from his ears, from the top of his 
head he drove it blade deep into the turf. 

“Playing mumbly-peg with yourself, McGinty?” 

McGinty fell on all fours, startled by the sudden voice. 
With a grunt he climbed to his feet, putting the knife in 
his pocket. “Mumbly-peg,” he said. “Just a few old 
tricks. ’ ’ 

“Sharp tricks,” said Clay. “Knives cut. Like women. 
I’ll want you tonight, McGinty.” 

“All r-right. I’m here.” 

Clay had whispered. But the man with amber glasses, 
following him around the veranda smoking a pipe, hap¬ 
pened to overhear. 


208 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


XLIII. DAY OF DOOM: ELEVEN THAT NIGHT: 

SCOTLAND YARD 

D OWN into the patio grill-room of the Royal Poin- 
settia old Grady stumbled. Even here the flags 
of glazed bricks were scuffled by dancing feet. 
Restlessly, restlessly moved the dancers; or stood in a spot 
and jiggled up and down again. Soon the heavy tram¬ 
pling of dancing in the ballroom above ceased, and orches¬ 
tra and dancers came down. 

A fountain flickered in the center of the patio. Heavy 
baskets of ferns hung about. Out the windows stretched 
mysterious gardens and groves of palms. Groves of palms 
and gardens clear down to the river where lay the Thorn. 
Old Tim glanced out and saw the Thorn’s red port light 
like the red star Mars. 

Caged birds sang. The night was heavy and hot as 
steam. The musicians sweated and toiled. The faces of 
young girls dancing were glistening, their hair in damp 
strings. But still they toddled on and forth, as though 
they had sworn a vow to Vesta or Priapus to dance the 
planets under. 

Bunnie Hoag hummed a song into the ears of Laurence 
Spencer, or as near as she could get to his lofty ears. 
More exactly, she hummed it into the second button of his 
shirt. Laurence felt dimly that she would fit very nicely 
into his coat pocket, with just her dark curls hanging out. 

“Don’t you just love Spanish music?” demanded Bun¬ 
nie, tapping his back to the time of the dance. 

“Love what?”—“Spanish music.”—“Yes, indeed!” 
said Laurence, scenting the fragrance of her curls. 

Old Tim had reserved the largest table in the grill. He 
had planned a supper in honor of Mrs. Mallow; but Mrs. 
Mallow’s love for him had gone, as such loves do. Now 
he sat almost alone, and with a maudlin voice invited 
whomever passed to come and bide a wee. 


ELEVEN THAT NIGHT 


209 


Birds of various feathers assembled to his invitation. It 
is an honor to sup with a millionaire, even for a millionaire. 
Old Professor Schermerhorn, squeaking and pulling the 
six hairs of his beard, sipped a weak highball delicately. 
Mrs. Weinvoll occupied the honored place at Tim’s right 
hand. No one had invited her; but no one had restrained 
her. Exuberant pride had colored her face a brick red. 
She had never hoped that God would be so good as to let 
her eat shrimps with a Grady. 

An exceedingly tall and thin young man stumbled down 
the grill steps and took Maveen from Deleon. Before the 
red-haired girl had time to look up at his face she knew 
who it was. With his first step he walked all over her 
shins. 

'‘Got to Biscayne at ten,” said young Schermerhorn, 
dangling about in a mosquito dance. “Got you at eleven. 
Going to get drunk at twelve.” 

He dragged her over to her father’s table, where Maveen 
unwillingly sat down. Squirmy slapped old Professor 
Schermerhorn on the back, till the professorial teeth 
rattled and almost spilled out. “Greetings, honored rela¬ 
tive! How are the jolly old bones?” Old Schermerhorn 
looked unpleasantly at his brother’s son, whom he held in 
senile contempt. Squirmy greeted Tim. “I see you’re 
drinking, Mr. Grady. I’ll sit down.” He made his words 

good, taking a bottle from Tim. 

Grady turned from jovial sottishness to quarrelsome sot¬ 
tishness as the hour grew longer and the drinks shorter. 
The looks he began to cast on Mrs. Weinvoll reminded 
that lady she was neither beautiful nor young, though un¬ 
doubtedly heavy and unfortunately virtuous. Old Tim lost 
his alcoholic wit. He had mixed his drinks. He began 
to gloom. Some who sat at his table observed the change 
in him. Having eaten enough and drunk enough, they left 

him with scanty thanks, or none. 

The grill was startled by seeing old Colonel Dawn enter, 
obviously on official business. Two uniformed police were 


210 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


at his back. “Stand by the door, Spike, Stubb,” said the 
Colonel. His withered body was bent. His thick black 
eyebrows were one line. Grimly he advanced on a table 
where Deleon sat with Arethusa Weinvoll. 

‘ ‘ Where is Lopez, Mr. Deleon ? ’ ’ he said, with an apology 
to the girl. 

Deleon betrayed vast surprise. He smoothed his hair. 
He twirled his sharp mustaches. “I understand he broke 
out of jail, Colonel. Is that so?” 

“Word came indirectly,” said the Colonel quietly, “that 
you were concealing him in your room, Mr. Deleon.” 

The fire left Deleon’s eyes. He drank ice water. And 
pulled a handkerchief out of his sleeve, and drank ice 
water again. 

“We searched for him, Mr. Deleon. Turned everything 
out. Now I want to know where he is!” 

“Good God!” said Deleon, startled white. “He wasn’t 
there?” 

The old Colonel nodded. “So you don’t know. Never 
mind. We’ll get him before morning. Mr. Deleon, do you 
know what can be done to a man who harbors a jail- 
breaker?” 

“I’ve heard,” said Deleon thickly. 

“It constitutes complicity after the fact.” 

“Yes, Sir.” 

“We’ve got a good jail.” 

Tou wouldn’t put me in jail,” cried Deleon, in a hoarse 
whisper.. “If I ever see him again, Colonel, I swear I’ll 
wring his neck! I’ll bring him straight to you. I don’t 
know anything about him.” 

Excuse me, Ma m, ’ said the Colonel to Arethusa, 
stalking away. 

“What a hideous old man!” whispered Arethusa, touch¬ 
ing Deleon’s sleeve. Though for the truth of it, the old 
Colonel was quite pleasant. 

Let s go, said Deleon heavily, putting his empty glass 
to his lips. 


ELEVEN THAT NIGHT 


211 


They went out. Mrs. Weinvoll was so interested in her 
famous Mr. Grady that she did not see. Through the gar¬ 
dens, through the groves of palms, all through Biscayne 
the search w T ent on that night for Greasy Pete. 

Black memories had come again to old Tim Grady. He 
thought of his dreams of the afternoon. With a sharp 
movement he snatched Mrs. Weinvoll’s wrist, fixing her 
with his red eyes. “Hark ye!” he said, drawing her 
closer to him. 

Mrs. Weinvoll gasped. What terrible iniquities he was 
about to speak she did not dare guess. She fluttered. 
“No, no, no,” she said to herself. “I am a lady.” Ter¬ 
rified, yet hoping to be tempted. 

“ ’Twas murder!” hoarsely said old Tim Grady. He 
turned his eyes around, from young Schermerhorn to old 
Schermerhorn, to all who heard. “ ’Twas murder in its 
eyes, gintlemen. Will ye stand for that? 

Uprose no man who would not stand for it. All under¬ 
stood old Tim Grady was soused. 

Grady was angry at the lack of attention. I won t 
stand for it!” he shouted. “Something will be done about 

it!” 

Maveen arose in a flurry, seeing the storm lowering. 
Old Grady reached forth before she could escape, clutching 
a fistful of her gown. She drew hack, but he held her fast. 
“That’s right. Ye know it. Don’t ye run! Ye heard 

me calling!” 

Old Tim was roaring like a bull. Maveen thought the 
eyes of the whole world were on her. She would like to 
have the flags of the floor open up and drop her down to 
the pit. Hatefully she wondered if all her life she would 

have to know these fits. 

She heard laughter, saw the swimming, grinning faces. 
It is amusing to see pride humbled, to see a red-haired girl 
in a passion. Maveen grew more furious as she tried to be 

calm. . _ . 

Old Tim pointed his free hand directly to old Schermer- 


212 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


horn. The professor wabbled his mouth. “I had the 
dream that I was mur-rdered!” he shouted. '‘How do ye 
like that?” Professor Schermerhorn gasped. 

Squirmy winked his far eye and reached for the liquor 
bottle. Mrs. Weinvoll wrung her hands. Mrs. Dusty 
Hoag began hysterical giggling. She looked, in the ill- 
fitting black gown which draped her bony frame, like a 
disgraceful skeleton. 

Maveen ripped away her dress. “I like it fine!” she 
said. She slapped him ringingly on the face. “Be re¬ 
spectable ! ’ she said, and tried to slap him again. 

For a long, long time old Tim Grady sat at table. 
Silently his guests left him, Squirmy emptying the dregs 
of the bottle as a parting shot. The music died. The 
dancers went away. Lights were flicked out in the grill, 
and the caged birds tucked their heads in sleep. A soli¬ 
tary waiter hovered about. The fountain flashed no more. 

The stupefaction of sitting at the right hand of Timothy 
Grady had quite stultified Mrs. Weinvoll. At last she be¬ 
came conscious of the increasing chilliness, the darkness, 
and her position. She remembered her matronly dignity 
and the stiict standards of Milwaukee. Gathering up her 
skirts, she hopped away like a kangaroo. Uncertainly at 
the exit she paused. She dropped a curtsey. 

Old Tim Grady saw one last man sitting at a table not 
far away. Through amber glasses this man read a news¬ 
paper, though the lights were dim and low. 

Grady remembered that this fellow had tried to bump 
him on the veranda of the Poinsettia. No one else was 
visible with whom he might stage a battle. He imagined 
the man with amber glasses stared at him too indecently. 
Tossing down a glass, old Tim stared back. The man 

paid no attention. Tim snarled. He banged fists on his 
table. 

Holding heavily to chairs, reeling a little, Grady stepped 

°r r . t0 ..»h Stranger - “ Wel1 ’ what d0 y e intind doing 
about it? he demanded. The man surveyed him Qoldly. 


ONE THAT NIGHT 


213 


"Ye don’t need to stare at me like a monkey!” old Tim 
yelled. He paused. "I’m as good a man as ye are!” lie 
said brightly. 

The taciturnity of the man with amber glasses oppressed 
old Tim. The eyes behind those glasses were dark and 
fierce, and old Tim Grady deemed that in a nightmare or 
foul weather he had seen those eyes before. He leaned 
over the napery, striking down his fists. "Get out!” he 
shouted. 

The man did not get out. With a frown he returned 
to the reading of his newspaper. "Get out,” Tim said 
less certainly. The man turned his paper with much flut¬ 
tering of leaves. He filled a pipe and smoked it. I don t 
like your impudence,” said Tim. "I won’t abide it! Get 
out! ” 

The man with amber glasses stroked his temples. His 
lean fingers stole up beneath his dry red hair, seeming to 
walk like a spider’s feet. 

"Who are ye!” yelled old Tim, working himself into 
passion. "Where do ye come from? Why don’t ye an- 
swer-r me 1 ” 

"I come from Scotland Yard,” said the man with am¬ 
ber glasses. 

Old Tim Grady fell back, whimpering. He began to 
choke. Lights shone on those amber glasses. They crim¬ 
soned. They were twin round moons. 


XLIV DAY OF DOOM: ONE THAT NIGHT: 

THE BLACK KING 

R OSE DAWN shivered beneath awnings on the 
afterdeck long hours after Laurence brought her 
to the Thorn. She pressed her knees. Hoarse 
drum and viols drifted through the even groves of palms. 

So they dance. So they dance. 

“0 God!” she thought. "I used to dance like that. 
Voices of laughter. Music of love. Soft words too 


214 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


sweet to last in this hot land. A girl softly crying some 
place near the river: “0 Gay! 0 Gay! ’ ’ Wind rustling 

tall crests of palms. Lights went out. And all sounds 
perished. 

Rose heard some place behind her black Tom stirring 
about. He had never walked so softly; she could almost 
see his velvet fingers. His breath was hushed. What a 
great panther was he! The fear she had known when 
Tim Grady first brought Tom to her had never left Rose 
Dawn. Once she had seen his eyes fully on her. Remem¬ 
bering that glance, she drew a wrap about her shoulders 
and shivered. 

Her mother was snoring. Unevenly droned that sawing 
sound. With a snortle and a gasp Mrs. Higgs turned on 
her bed. She breathed more evenly. 

Only the three of them on that ghostly white yacht, she, 
her mother, and Tom. When Tim came home, that would 
be four. 

“Are you there, dearie?” called Mrs. Higgs. “What’s 
that big fat black nigger doing, sniffing and prowling and 
sneaking and snooping around in Tim’s cabin? Is he—” 
Ma Higgs drifted off to nightmares, still talking. 

“Tom!” Rose called softly. “Tom, what are you 
doing?” 

Her only answer was a grummer. Tom was in his an¬ 
cestral tropics. He did not speak meekly these days. His 
mumbling might be interpreted as an opinion that Tom was 
no Georgia ace of spades, but a free born Virginian colored 
gentleman, and as good as anyone else. More softly he 
stirred. She heard a cupboard open. 

Rose’s beautiful eyes reflected back the misty little stars. 
No moon had yet arisen. The stars fainted with heat. 
Now a still wind came up, more cooling. The river rip¬ 
pled. In refracted streams the lights of the Thorn cut 
the water like swords. 

A heavy tread struck on the wooden quay. Rose turned 
to go into her stateroom, thinking it was Tim. She did 


ONE THAT NIGHT 


215 


not care to see him. “Ahoy!” cried a voice she knew as 
van Chuch’s. “Who’s watching on the Thorn?” 

The woman walked along the decks to the gangplank, 
meeting him before he came aboard. “What do you 
want, Mr. van Chuch?” 

Staring uncertainly in the darkness, van Chuch doffed his 
hat. “Good evening. Is Mr. Grady aboard?” He re¬ 
ceived her denial. “Well,” he said more loudly, advanc¬ 
ing a step up the plank, his hands sliding back and forth 
on the railings. “I wish you’d tell him I ve got a tempo¬ 
rary injunction issued against him, forbidding him to sail 
out of Biscayne port.” 

“I think he has no such intention, Mr. van Chuch.” 

Van Chuch was sullenly angry that she didn’t address 
him as Captain. “It’s a good thing,’’ he snapped. “I’ve 
got his crew that he signed up for the full voyage, and 
I’ll see that they have their rights. And I’ve got my 
rights, too, Mrs. Grady. He can’t think he’ll dismiss us 
this way without legal measures. There’s a law on the 
deep water, Mrs. Grady!” 

‘ ‘ All right, ’ ’ said Rose, dismissing him. ‘ ‘ This is hardly 

the time, though, to argue about it.” 

She turned her back. After some hesitation van Chuch 
walked away. 

Mrs. Higgs stuck her spiked curls out of her door as 
Rose went back. Dolefully she rubbed her sleepy eyes. 
“Ain’t Grady back yet, dearie? For Heaven’s sake, what 
is that nigger Tom up and doing? He’s opy’ing and clos¬ 
ing all sorts and kinds of cubberds. I ve been listening 
to him for the last fifty million hours. He’s just natchelly 
got into Grady’s liquor, that’s what he has. I’ll stop 

him! ’ ’ 

Rose made an impatient motion. “Why should I worry 

about Tim’s rye?” . 

Perhaps she cared little about anything which belonged 

to Tim Grady. Mrs. Higgs caught that thought. “We 
should worry,” she said. Nevertheless, being a born trou- 

m 


216 ONCE IN A RED MOON 


ble-maker, she shuffled out and opened Grady’s stateroom 
door. 


lou, Tom Jefferson! What are you sneaking and 
snooping about for in there t Come out here! Come out 
at once, Sir!” 

Ma Higgs never used the designation of Sir except to 
dogs. It is likely she confused it with cur. “ Stand up 

and beg, Fido ! Stand up, Sir! ’ 7 was a favorite command 
of hers. 


Now her tone bore all that contempt. “Answer me, 
Sir!” she cried, advancing into the cabin. Rose stood 

nervously at the doorway. “Answer me, Sir! I’ll_ 

Wee! ” She squealed. 

Giant Tom pushed her away contemptuously. His ter¬ 
rible eyes rolled in the darkness. His breath was thick 
with drink. Mrs. Higgs squealed again, terrified out of 
her tongue. She tumbled down on Tim’s bed. 

Out of the cabin Tom came striding, stalking. Straight 
at Rose he stared. 0, horrible were his glances! She 
could not move, could not move even when she felt his 
hand feeling its way up her arm. 

Pretty girl! ” he purred. His voice was guttural, never 
so thick before. Gone were the polished sentences, the 
Northern tones. “Don’t you be afraid,” he whispered. 

I m a man,” he whispered. “A man!” He struck his 
chest. 


Fiercely passionate the purple tropic night. His shaven 

head was terrible to see. His eyes were foamy as storm 
waves. 

“He’ll whip me, the roaring dog!” (His hands were on 

her upper arms.) “He’ll God-damn me, will he!” (His 
hands were on her shoulders.) “Me!” (His hands 

8~«> *•*•■> "1 *» ■ king!” th. giant roared! 

am a king! This great heart—” (He drew her 
pinched face towards him. His straight nostrils were 
quivering. He crooned.) “0, woman-” 

Rose screamed. Again she screamed as his mighty arms 
went around her. 


ONE THAT NIGHT 


217 


Steps thundered. A shout: “What’s that?” From 
the dock a man leaped clear two yards of black water, 
caught the Thorn’s stern railing, and toppled over it. It 
was van Chuch. 

The negro dropped Rose. She fell against the cabin- 
house, tearing at her cheeks. With his hands jammed in 
his coat pockets van Chuch advanced. His short, sturdy 
little bow legs never faltered. His square head was drawn 
between his shoulders. 

Tom drew up to his full height, swinging his arms gently. 
Van Chuch thrust his face close up to Tom. tie had been 
master of men, and in this moment it counted. 

Easily could Tom have throttled him, as easily as a cat. 
Van Chuch drew himself up directly, glaring long at the 
negro. Tom’s eyes dropped. Van Chuch’s hand came out 
of his pocket. Flatly he slapped the negro. 

“March !” he commanded loudly. 

He pointed to the gangplank. Hunching his shoulders, 
the great negro marched. Van Chuch followed him toe 
to heel. Down the plank, along the dock. Into the groves 
of palms. Into the night. 

Rose, fallen in a chair, heard van Chuch shouting. 

‘ ‘ Halt! ” He shouted again, and started running. But 
Tom Jefferson, fleet as jungle beast, sped away in the black 
wind. The shadows wrapped about him. He was gone. 


XLV. DAY OF DOOM: THREE THAT NIGHT: 

0 BLOODY MOON! 

P ALE shone the stars, and white with tears. The 
light they cast was less a light than a dull argent 
shadow. Dark roses blew within the gardens of 
the Royal Poinsettia. The smooth palms, sleek and bare, 
towered to high Heaven and the spangled night. They 
tossed the stars in their topmost crests. Theii fronds 
caught hold of chaos. 


218 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Deleon walked nervously through the shadows. He saw 
the red light of the Thorn gleaming by the river, answer¬ 
ing fire to the light of his cigaret. A tenebrous rose-tree 
struck his cheek, and he startled. He was afraid. 

0, something walked abroad that night! Something 
hissed within the therk! The palms were gibbets on which 
dead goblins swung. 

The wind sang small. An old tune it sang. Smaller 
than the wind was the soul of Gay Deleon. He whimpered 
mutely, afraid of the great dark. 

A hand lay on his shoulder. Deleon sagged from the 
knees. Screams would not come. In terror he clasped a 
rose branch, crushing its spikes into his palm. 

“Don’t bleat, Gay! It’s Pete. They searched your 
room, I know. I heard them coming, and got away in 
time. What’s the matter, Gay ? ’ ’ 

“My heart.” 

“Your heart!” Pete’s laughter rattled like dried peas. 
His mirth was brief. “Gay?” 

“What the devil do you want with me now? Do you 
know I’m near in jail for your sake?” 

“Sweet of you,” whispered Pete. “Listen, Gay. Old 
Grady s still up at the Poinsettia. He had some sort of 
fit, and young Spencer has been working on him. He won’t 

be back to the Thorn for a long time yet. Now’s the 
time!” 

“For what?” 

To tell Rose he s wanted in Ireland. McGinty may 
have lied, but she’ll believe it. Wring her!” Pete made 
a motion with his hands. 

“No!” 

“0, sure, Gay.” 

Deleon thought. He looked at the white and red lights 
of the Thorn. They aroused some courage, they were so 
brave and bright. A shadow stirred. He startled. 
“What was that?”—“Nothing, Gay. Only the wind.” 
Deleon thought further. If not for the sake of money, for 


THREE THAT NIGHT 


219 


her own sake it might be worth while to share a secret 
with Rose Grady. 

“Grady might find us, Pete.” 

“You’ve got the soul of a rabbit.” Pete spat. “I’ll 
take care of Grady!” 

At the edge of the quay Pete stopped. “I’ll wait here,” 
he said. “Rose loves me like poison. Yon know, Gay.” 

Deleon hesitated. He saw something stir on the Thorn’s 
stern, and clasped Pete’s arm. He was terrified to think 
old Tim Grady might have flown, like some foul witch on 
broomstick steed, from the Poinsettia to the Thorn; might 
be waiting for him now. Deleon did not care to meet the 
old man’s wrath, drunk or sober, righteous or wrongful, 
day or night. 

Pete laughed silently again. “It’s Rose. See the 
shadow of her head against the sky ? No one else aboard 
but the old lady and the nigger. He’s another good reason 
I don’t care to go aboard.” 

Deleon crept silently up the plank, and aft down the 
decks. Rose had slipped down in her deck-chair, half 
asleep. Deleon saw tears cold on her cheeks. Alone, un¬ 
guarded, the sleeping beauty! Would a kiss awaken 

her? 

Rose opened her eyes as Deleon slipped to a seat beside 
her. “I thought it was—” she murmured. “Gay, what 
are you doing here?” 

“Didn’t he leave me in charge of you?” Deleon asked, 
with tongue always ready for women. “I saw your bright 
eyes, Rose, and wanted a moment of talk. Nothing like 
you,’.Rose,” he said more confidently, “to make the night 

seem lovely.” 

Rose looked at him sadly. “Tim may be down any mo¬ 
ment now, Gay. What can I tell him when he finds you 
here? I wonder, do you ever think of other people?” 
(“Always think of you,” Gay muttered.) “You know 
what he is when he’s angry, like some strange wild beast. 
I’m afraid of him, Gay!” 


220 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Tim won’t be down. He had a dose of the D. T.s— 
passed out cold.” 

“He was with that Mallow woman?” Rose shuddered. 

Deleon shrugged; he offered a cigaret. “No? You 
don’t need to be afraid he’ll find me here. Longer you’re 
married to him, less you’ll see him. When you’ve been 
married a year, any one of a thousand women will know 
his face better than you.” That wasn’t the right way to 
begin; he was talking of women; he should talk of Mc- 
Ginty. “No danger of his finding me here,” he said. 

“So you’re not being brave for my sake, Gay?” she 
mocked. 

Rose fell back in her chair, looking wearily away from 
him. Her knees were doubled under her. She fidgeted 
and played with her curls. Her bosom was turned to Gay 
Deleon. It was lustrous as satin. Deleon’s heart grew 
hot. 

With a hushed gasp he looked at her night-enhanced 
beauty. Never had she seemed so lovely. Gay Deleon, 
whom many women had loved, who had never loved a single 
woman, felt as much love for Rose Dawn as he could ever 
know. 

He wondered if he had not been a fool for letting her go 
when he might have had her. He was doubtful if he might 
ever have had her. What had he been to her? It was 
not true, as he had complacently dreamed, she could have 
been his when John Dawn died. Never! One woman to 
whom he was as dust. 

Nervously Deleon brushed his glossy hair. Rose gazed 
at the river with sad musings. Her hand, bent like a 
weary lily, touched her breast. The desire for her was 
like ten day hunger in the desert, like a thirst unquenched. 

“Rose!” he whispered. She turned. Deleon faltered. 
“Tim Grady—” 

She looked at him curiously over her shoulder. Deleon 
staied down at her tace from above. Sweet was the curve 
of her cheek, and dimples held pockets of darkness. 


THREE THAT NIGHT 


221 


i ^ 


y y 


(< 


<( 


y y 


Rose, Tim Grady- 

; Tell me, Gay! Is lie ill ? He isn’t- 
'He’s a murderer!” Deleon hissed.^ “He’s been wanted 

forty years in Ireland by tbe police 1 
‘ ‘ What on earth, Gay ! ’ ’ 

“I know it’s so!” 

Rose looked out at the dark river. “Some one has been 
trying to make fnn of you; or you are trying to make tun 

of me. It’s not possible,” she said. 

“It is true!” Deleon spoke with conviction. 

Rose started up, becoming more excited. “But you say 
he is still wanted, after all these years? Why, if that s so, 

he—he—” 

“He’ll hang!” 

Rose relaxed. This was too new and terrible to be 
grasped. It must be thought over a long time before she 
could understand it. Onee or twice she shook her love y 
curls. Deleon stared up at her, his eyes dilated, his sott 
hands trembling with the passion of his thoughts, 
f ^ i Rose!” 

“I don’t see why you tell me this,” she whispered, even 
if this is true. It can’t concern me. I don t want to 

k*‘ Well,’’ said Gay. He swallowed: ‘ 1 Well!” He could 

think of nothing more. 

Rose jumped to her feet and leaned over the stern rails, 
gripping hard to the brass. She stared intently down the 
dark dock. Dull steps rumbled on the wooden planking. 

< < it’ s Tim 1 He’s almost on the gangplank! ’ ’ 

Deleon looked right and left with rapid glances, a 
scorpion in a ring of fire. No way out! The silky river 
rippled against the Thorn. Its infuscate waters hid hor¬ 
rors beyond thought. He bit the back of his hand, sup-. 

■pressing the desire to shriek. , 

Old Tim Grady’s voice now sounded as he stumb e 

the gangplank, repeatedly trying to feel his way up. e 
staggered back, and again lurched forward to ascen . 




222 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Damn ye! Damn ye!” lie roared. “Who’s moving 
this plank?” 

Deleon was not stirred with fear of disgrace for Rose. 
He cared not what happened to her now. Terror possessed 
him. He knew the wildest and littlest fear the heart may 
know, the fear of death. 

He ’ll kill me! What can I do against a great big 
drunken brute like that?” 

He, the great gambler, was a poor sort to gamble with 
death. Though she herself was frightened, Rose spared 
him a glance of contempt. “Still the same old Gay. You 
never forget yourself. ’ , 

“Why didn’t Pete stop him?” Deleon whispered in pant¬ 
ing gasps. “He swore he’d do it. Hasn’t he a knife?” 

Old Grady was wavering on the quay. He grasped the 
gangplank railing and inched his way up. “Who’s 
there?” he cried. “Who is ’t with ye, Rose?” 

No one,” said Rose in her terror, knowing full well 
what would happen to her if Grady found Deleon. “I’m 
all alone.” 

Old Tim growled. “I see some one! I see him! Don’t 
ye lie to me!” 

No one!” Rose cried again. To Deleon she whispered, 
“Not there. The next door!” 

Deleon had been trying to enter old Tim’s cabin. His 
stultified hands obeyed Rose’s directions, opening her cabin 
door. He slipped through. 

Grady swayed down the deck, feeling his way with hands 
on the cabin-house. He lurched to the stern-deck and 
grasped for a chair. Rattling it steadily, he glared at 
Rose, who tried to meet him calmly. Old Tim gave her 
owlish looks. His eyes rolled upward; his throat moved 
convulsively. He threw out his arm, losing his balance and 
his hold of the chair. He sat down heavily on deck. 

Grasping the rail, he painfully hauled himself upright 
again. 

Where is he ?” he muttered. Growing angrier at sound 


THREE THAT NIGHT 


223 


of his own angry voice, “Where is he?” he roared. “But 
let me put my hands on him! ’ ’ He wallowed in oaths un¬ 
intelligible even to the devils he named. “I know of your 
doings, ye white witch! Where is your lover-r ? Where 
are ye hiding him? 0, ye damned whore!” 

That was enough, I think, to kill old Tim Grady. 

He slammed open the door of his cabin, cunningly alert 
to surprise some lurker within. “I’ve got ye!” he yelled, 
kicking about the floor insanely. “There! Take that!” 
He snarled like a dog worrying a bone. “Arrah! Out 
with ye! ” Less certainly, as he found no one, ‘ ‘I’ve got 
ye ! W T here the Hell are ye ? ” 

Deleon, cowering on the other side of thin walls, in Rose’s 
cabin, felt like a grass snake whom the great king snake 
is hunting. He knew the sharp anguish of dissolution. 

‘ 1 He’s in there, ye common wench! ’ ’ Old Grady rushed 
towards Rose’s door after lurching from his own. “How 
many lover-rs are ye hiding ? ’ ’ 

The night was dark. Now all the stars had fallen, and 
on the horizon the new full moon was gathering strength 
to soar. 

Death-white, death-sick, death-terrified, Rose Dawn stood 
with her back to the door. No acting now in the shivering 
terror of her face as her arms spread like a cross. It was 
the pose of the Grady super-drama “Sin.” Yes, the last 
reel. 

‘ ‘ Get out o ’ the way! ’’ Grady roared, giving her a heavy 
push. She cowered, but did not move. “So he’s in there! 
Ay, I’ll kill ’im with my hands! Out o’ my way! Ye 
are my wife. This is my ship. I go where I damned 
please!” 

“Take your hands off,” Rose whispered. “Take—them 
—off.” 

“No cur-r will hide behind your skirts, ye Molly Mc¬ 
Bride ! Out o ’ my way before I smash ye down! I ’ll 
strangle the two of ye togither! I ’ll knot ye in a gunny- 
sack and cast ye deep into the sea!” 


224 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Rose stood aside. “Go on in,” she whispered. 

Deleon saw, as he cowered behind a trunk, in one yellow 
flash all the days of his life like a pack of cards that is 
spilled. In mad terror he caught up a pair of shears, 
holding them like a dirk. 

Grady halted, his hand on the latch. “Ye say for me 
to go on in?” 

“If you want to.” Rose was sobbing. “But it will be 
the last! ’ ’ 

“The last! What do ye mane?” His roaring soul was 
shaken. Through the door’s opening crack blew a dismal 
draft. “What do ye mane by saying that to me?” He 
paused, still fumbling at the latch. “Is he in here?” he 
demanded, his voice wavering. 

“Do you doubt my word?” whispered Rose, who had 
given no word. 

“Ye're a divil! He is in there! I’ll tear-r him out! 
I’ll r-rip—” 

“Look, Tim!” whispered Rose. “0, look at that!” 

The moon rose late that night. But now it was arisen. 

On the horizon it lay as a long oval, full, red, unwink¬ 
ing. Over the sea it lay, over bay and bar. It gathered 
upward, and stood as a full round circle. Round, round, 
red as eternity. 

“0, bloody moon!” screamed a voice from shore. “0, 
bloody moon!” 

Old Tim Grady yelled. With eyes upon that dreadful 
light, he backed to his own door. He stumbled through. 
He turned the lock. He howled again. For a little while 
light shone from his cabin. Then darkness and silence. 


XLVI. DAY OF DOOM: HOUR OF FATE 


O ALMS waving on the shore in sorcery. Ripples on 
the river. Gay Deleon creeps from the Thorn and 
JL goes to join Pete. The light which flashed for an 
instant in old Tim Grady’s cabin has gone out. Gay Del- 



DAY OF DOOM: HOUR OF FATE 225 

eon darkens into the night. Like a cricket he is gone. 

The wind which rises in the nether void, beyond the 
grave, beyond the night of nights, blows unremittingly, 
calling wearily, running desolately over unsure waters. 
All night through it blows. 

Hark to the voices of the unhappy dead! Of the un¬ 
shriven, of the unforgiven, of them cut off by murderous 
hands. Now hold your heart, now close your eyes, for 
ghosts glide on the lances of the crimson moon! 

The Thorn, pale as mist, rocks heavily, for a horror of 
deep silent waters sucks her keel. Thin vapor wraiths 
upon Black River. Upon the pressing shore vain waver¬ 
ings of trees, vain apparitions, vain memories. Vainest of 
ghosts are memories. And with them all Terror, first born 
and mightiest of passions of the soul, stalking with gryfon 

hands through the dark. T , 

The morning and the evening were your first day, Lord 
Adonoi; as they may be your last. But to what devils mad 

and howling have you given up the night! 

A cry arises from the waters, the voice of some supernal 
watchman watching out the stars: “ And all is well! 

Trees monstrous as mountains stir in the crying of t le 
wind. They bend, they dance, they cower, hiding within 
themselves for dread of their own unholy countenances. 
Shadows flitting on the shore are tenuous as air, black as 
dead hope, foul as swamp water. Yet strength is m them, 
in those shadows, a murderous power, to claw the heart 
out of the breast, strangling the breath. 

Red and green lights quiver and shake on the river 
tides; shake and corruscate and fade away, drowned in 
deep blankets of water. Green for the fecund earth, red 
for fire, dark waters for the night which endly covers all. 

Faint and far away beats heavily the washing of the 
waters of Bay Mimayne. Fainter yet, beyond the coral 
shoals, the harsh booming of the mighty sea, rolling past 

chaos and the formless deeps! 

'‘All is well-11!” rolls forth that cry across the waters. 


226 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Dear hour of sleep and dreams which soar to Heaven! 
If ever all be well, surely it should be now, within the 
silver silence. For the frustrate, great deeds. For the 
overthrown, victory. For the lover, love too frail and dear 
to be remembered. For the weary and the wise man and 
the drunkard, oblivion, which surpasses all desires. 

Cold blows the tropic wind. Cold blow T s the wind until 
the dawning. On old Tim Grady, on his bed, shines 
through a little porthole one red strale of the moon. But 
that light passes, and there is no more light at all. The 
moon goes under. 

What dreams come to Rose Dawn, sleeping in silken 
beauty bathed by the cold moon fires—what dreams to 
Deleon, tossed by his own private devils—what dreams to 
black Tom, fugitive within the slimy swamps—what dreams 
to Maveen, Clay, Mrs. Mallow, Anthony, and the rest of 
this pulsing world, no man may say. Least of all the 
dreamers, for dreams are a mystery past reckoning. 

Some damned night bird, beset with devils, screams with 
a deadly cry. The moon is gone. 

No dreams to old Tim Grady. He lies on his bed, star¬ 
ing with wide eyes past roof and night and stars above 
him, his hands gripped tight on air and shadows, the 
haft of the driven serpent knife rising like a cross from 
his breast! 


XLVII. FAITHFUL TO THEE, CYNARA! 

L ALTRENCE SPENCER caught Maveen on the 
beach in the morning. “I’ve got something for 
you, Maveen,” he blushed. 

They sat down cross-legged in the sand. Maveen ad¬ 
justed her green bathing cap. “What on earth—going to 
read me something ? 0, hello ! There’s Mr. Clay just com¬ 

ing out of that blue racer. Doesn’t he look cynical?” 
Thornwood Clay came towards them. Dark half-moons 


FAITHFUL TO THEE, CYNARA! 


227 


were beneath his eyes. He sat down with them. “Don’t 
mind, do you?” Maveen took one of his cigarets. 

“You look like a night of it,” said Laurence. “Didn’t 
see you last night.” 

“0,” said Clay lazily. “What’s this—a poem?” 

Laurence blushed again. “It is an—ah—” 

Maveen bent and took a light from Clay, their noses al¬ 
most touching. “Little Boy Blue’s going to read to me,” 
she said, looking long into Clay’s eyes with siren glances. 

“ It’s a poem, ’ ’ muttered Laurence, swallowing. (“ How 
nice!” yawned Maveen.) “It’s called: ‘How Wise You 
Are!’ ” Laurence ventured further. 

Clay smiled. Laurence felt his pink cheeks burning 
clear up to his bald scalp. “How nice!” said Maveen, 
with more gusto. 

Laurence began reading in a rapid mumble. “It’s 
called: ‘How Wise You Are!’ 0, I told you that. It’s 
a poem. I wrote it last night. It’s like this— 

“We walked beneath the moon 
Wherein this burning winter melts like June. 

0, lovely, lovely are your emerald eyes 
Which quiver, dusk, and lighten to the tune 
Of viol and violin in melodies! 

Now will a song arise. 

“Low heard I that sweet song 
Striking an interlude. ‘0 silence long 
And vain forgetting! Will our love afar 
After the years be drowned as that sweet song?’ 

Then rose your clear voice, tinkling like a star: 

‘0 lad, how wise you are!’ ” 

Silence dropped. “Neat,” said Clay at last. Laurence 
fumbled the leaves. 

“What does it mean?” Maveen asked impatiently. 
“I’m sure I never said any such silly things at all. 
Goodness, Mr. Clay!” She turned to him, lifting up her 


228 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


eyelids so Clay could see clearly. 4 ‘ Are my eyes emerald ? ’ ’ 

“So the poet says,” Clay laughed. 

“It doesn’t seem to make much sense/’ said Maveen 
frankly. ‘‘ Let’s go in swimming. ’ ’ 

Grimly Laurence started to tear the leaves to tatters. 
But he bethought himself. No occasion for committing 
infanticide. He folded the poem and thrust it in the 
pockets of his bathing-trunks. Disillusioned, he looked 
at Maveen. 

Noon passed. Laurence bought sandwiches from the 
beach restaurant and ate them in his dripping bathing-suit. 
Little Arethusa Weinvoll came hopping up on all fours 
over the sand. She closed her pretty little freckled eyes, 
wiggled her pretty little freckled nose, and Laurence fed 
her puppy-dog bites of sandwich. In her innocence she 
made much play of her milk-white limbs, which shone to 
great advantage in her little boy’s bathing-suit. 

“Where’s your sweetie, Deleon?” Laurence asked, im¬ 
mediately sorry. 

“Don’t speak his name to me!” cried Arethusa, crouch¬ 
ing down on the sand. “Just you don’t dare!” 

“I’m sorry,” Laurence stumbled. “I thought I saw 
you at supper with him last night.” He pulled out a 
sodden handkerchief and wiped her nose. 

Mrs. Weinvoll, skipping grimly over the sands like a 
kangaroo, called sharply to her daughter. Mrs. Dusty 
Hoag was with her, in her long black bathing-suit looming 
ominously against the horizons of sea blues and greens. 

“Thusy,” said Mrs. Weinvoll, giving that young lady 
a searching look as she gamboled up. “Where were you 
last night?” 

“Good Heavens, mamma! In bed, of course.” 

Mrs. Weinvoll nodded at Mrs. Hoag in satisfaction. “I 
told you so!” 

“I didn’t want you to mention it!” cried Mrs. Hoag in 
distress. Her dark, work-sodden face flushed. “I didn’t 
suspect Arethusa for the world!” 


FAITHFUL TO THEE, CYNARA! 


229 


“We heard, Thusy,” Mrs. Weinvoll explained, “that a 
young girl no more ’n your own age was seen last night 
in a very disrep-table place with Deleon. ” 

“0 mamma!” 

“Of course, of course, honey. Don’t you cry.” 

“O mamma, he told me—” 

“See what you’ve done!” Mrs. Weinvoll cried to Mrs. 
Hoag, roused to ferocity at sight of her daughter’s tears. 
Mrs. Hoag waited with arms crossed in grim Methodistic 
silence. “See how you’ve hurt the feelings of this poor 
little lamb ! ’ ’ 

“Mamma, I didn’t mean—” 

“Don’t you cry any more, honey! There, there, mamma 
knows. Mamma trusts her little girl. You’d better keep 
an eye on your own! ’ ’ she angrily advised Mrs. Hoag. 
“Instead of casting aspersions on those who are above 
aspersions. You’d better think a thought! What are you 
crying for, Thusy? Mamma doesn’t believe a word of it.” 

Mrs. Hoag stood in uncertainty, tugging at the blouse 
of her suit. “I don’t want to have you think, Mis’ 
Weinvoll—” 

“There’s only one thing I want to say to you!” shouted 
Mrs. Weinvoll, though she had a hundred things she wanted 
to say, after the manner of women. “And that is: watch 
out for your ow T n, Mrs. Hoag! That’s all I have to say ! ’ ’ 

And, after the manner of women, she proceeded to say 
a hundred things. 

“It couldn’t be Bunnie!” Mrs. Hoag gasped. 

“0, and it couldn’t it! But it could be Arethusa! 
With your little Bunnie so sly and double-faced, deceiv¬ 
ing you all the time. I know that sort. They don’t fool 
me! She wears scarlet clothes, doesn’t she? And she was 
dancing with Mr. Grady last night, wasn’t she? Your 
child ! She’s a grown woman ! ’ ’ 

Mrs. Hoag’s face was sternly righteous. “Bunnie!” 
she cried, as the thought came home to her. “It was Bun- 
nie with that Deleon! 0, I could—I—” 


230 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Of course it was Bunnie,” Mrs. Weinvoll said furi¬ 
ously. “There, there, Thusy, honey! Mamma believes 
you. Don’t you cry any more ! ’ ’ 

Boosten Claude had brought Rose Dawn to the beach. 
Van Chuch saw her and came up with a greeting. “The 
negro got away from me last night,” he said. “But Colo¬ 
nel Dawn has his men out hunting. And others are hunt¬ 
ing,” he added grimly. “It’s good-by to Tom when they 
catch him!” 

Rose shuddered. She did not care for van Chuch, but 
she felt great gratitude towards him for his sturdy help 
the night before. And she was always gentle-hearted. 
She let him fall into step beside her, while Boosten Claude 
glared furiously around the satin of her shoulders. They 
went down to the sea. 

“I’m sorry I troubled you about that injunction last 
night,” van Chuch said. “I was angry. How is Mr. 
Grady this morning?” 

“He was still in his room when I left the Thorn Rose 
whispered. 

She left the two men at the shore, striking out for the 
horizon. 

Laurence Spencer caught sight of little Bunnie Hoag’s 
dark curls and scarlet gown. He threw his sandwiches to 
the chigoes and pursued her. 

“I’ve got something for you, Bunnie,” he said shyly. 

She closed her eyes. “Good to eat?” 

He dragged her to the sand. Frothy wavelets lapped 
their feet. “It’s a poem,” he blushed. “I made it up 
myself. It’s to you.” 

“0, how lovely!” she squealed, clapping her little hands. 
“I just adore poetry!” She laid her head on his shoul¬ 
der and closed her eyes again. “For me! Read it to 
me softly and slowly, Larry. It makes me shiver when 
you moan.” 

“It’s called: ‘Memini mihi!’ ” he faltered. 

“Um-m! Isn’t that thrilling!” 


FAITHFUL TO THEE, CYNARA! 


231 


“It’s Latin. It means: remember me!” 

“Yes,” said Bunnie wisely. “Of course.” 

And wondered how he ever knew so dreadfully much. 
He must think such deep thoughts, about immortality, and 
Latin, and medicine. Laurence in his turn was afraid he 
had got the Latin wrong, Bunnie seemed to know so much 
about it. He dug a mess of clammy paper from his trunks. 

“It’s a little torn,” he apologized. “And the water’s 
blurred it.” He unfolded it. The paper was a sticky 
wad, of the color and consistency of a hornet nest. “Never 
mind. I remember it.” 

“Speak it slowly, Larry. I love to hear poetry roll.” 

“We walked beneath the moon,” Laurence moaned. He 
did not permit himself to be hastened now, for Bunnie 
had her eyes closed and her head on his shoulder. Lau¬ 
rence moaned the N’s and M’s. “We walked beneath the 
moon, wherein this Floridan winter melts like June. 0, 
lovely, lovely were your emerald—shadowy! ” he shouted, 
making Bunnie jump. “Lovely were your shadowy 
eyes— ’ ’ 

“Shadowy eyes,” she repeated. “Don’t you just adore 
that!” 

“Indeed I do!” said Laurence, looking into her shadowy 
eyes. “I might as well begin again. ‘We walked be¬ 
neath the moon—’ ” 

For several minutes after he had ended Bunnie lay on 
his shoulder with eyes closed. The sun was warm, the 
crooning of the sea a slumber melody. Laurence had an 
unjpst suspicion she was asleep. Unjust, even if she was. 

jgfe 

XLYIII. MORROW’S MORROW 

T HEY peered into the windows of the cabin when 
morning of the second day had dawned. They 
broke open the door. Thus they found Tim 

Grady. 

The windows were nailed. The door was locked. 1 a- 


232 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


pers, pencils, a dictionary, a ‘ ‘ History of the Irish Kings, ’ ’ 
lay scattered over his breast, where some hand had knocked 
them. A dribble of ink from an overturned bottle had 
mingled with his red-gray hair. Strangely, on one arm 
had fallen a “Journal of the Days/’ Strangely, for his 
days were done. 

The gold-green serpent winked its emerald eyes from 
the haft of the knife within his breast. Ah, it was a lovely 
thing! And sharp. 

Above his head swung and batted a porthole no bigger 
than a man’s right arm. He did not heed the entering 
shaft of light, for he slept quite tranquilly. 

No such excitement in the state of Florida since the 
great freeze of ’96. No, nor such excitement in New York 
since the last election. 

“Tim Grady, the movie magnate! Worth ten million 
dollars!”—You can read it in the newspapers. 

Ten men may perish in one flash of death, in mine, in. 
shipwreck, or the roar of war, without one line to mention 
it, unless it be of a dull Monday morning. Ten murdered 
millions are worth front-page columns. That is immor¬ 
tality. 

Bulletins, specials, and what-not flashed on the wires 
north and west. The nation woke. It was interested. 
New York devoured the Grady mystery with its luncheon 
chops, San Francisco with its breakfast bacon. 

“It’s here,” said Arsen, in the offices of the Morning 
Mist. “What did I say?” 

“You said a lot,” replied the city editor wearily. “You 
always do.” 

“My intimate friend, Tony Anthony, said—” 

Colonel Dawn took charge. Mrs. Higgs wanted to tell 
him many things, but he staved her off. Still she talked 
on and on, endlessly, senselessly, with many knowing refer¬ 
ences to what-might-be-expected, and anybody-might-have- 
known, and cause-enough-Heaven-knows, and poor-old- 
man-he ’11-sleep-in-peace, and may-his-sins-be-forgiven-him. 


MORROW’S MORROW 


233 


and all the rest of the clatter which female Higgses are 
fond of saying in disaster. The old crow, the old buzzard, 
couldn’t keep her beak shut. 

Ominously Stubb and Spike shook their heads, ominously 
wagged them back and forth, after the immemorial man¬ 
ner of police at a mystery. They were like jays on a 
fence-rail. Spike, who had a bristly mustache, twirled 
it often; Stubb wished he had one to twirl. They stuck 
their thumbs in the armpits of their vests, showing their 
badges. 

Five dozen amateur sleuths arose as one man in Bis- 
cayne, and wandered around as five hundred. After a 
struggle, the old Colonel found he could not keep them 
from the Thorn. It was remarkable what detecting tal¬ 
ents lay buried in hitherto seemly appearing citizens. 
Boosten Claude, it developed, had a scent like a blood¬ 
hound. Anyway, he said he had, and he sniffed around, 
sometime on all fours, sometime hopping along on his 
haunches. 

Van Chuch trusted rather to his eagle eye. He stalked 
around with hands behind back, fixing everything with 
that eagle eye. Laurence Spencer only brought suspicion 
on himself by refusing, although a medical student, to 
analyze some cigar ashes found on the Thorn s deck. All 
criminals, practically, are traced by cigar ashes, as any 
child knows. Even young Schermerhorn poked about, 
doubling his tall neck to enter doors, tugging at his frail 
mustache. 

“I’ve seen that knife before,” he said sagely, survey¬ 
ing the heavy-bladed weapon. “Though where I saw the 
jolly old thing I can’t just think.” 

The knife went from hand to hand. Each man ran his 
fingers along the butcher’s blade. Each weighed it in his 
palm. Each turned it upside down, over, and round about. 
Each squinted at it thoughtfully, using first one eye and 
then the other. Each pinked his thumb with the point. 
Each nodded deeply, as though saying: “I thought so!” 


234 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Each one said nothing. Each one thought nothing. 

If that winking serpent handle had been stained with 
criminal prints, they were confounded with the fingerprints 
of all the detectives in Florida. If the deck had shown 
footprints, they were confounded with the footprints of 
all the detectives in Florida. 

Spike raised and lowered the window shades. Stubb 
tried the nails of the windows. Spike flapped the port¬ 
hole cover for half an hour. Stubb worked the door on its 
hinges. Crawling under the bed from the foot, Spike met 
Stubb crawling under from the head. Commotion ensued, 
and both scuttled backward out. 

“Shoe, Spike?”—“Sme. Shoe?”—“Sme. You scairt 
me.”—“Me, too.” 

“No need fiddling with those windows,” said van Chuch. 
“You can’t get the nails out from inside. But here.” He 
gave a twist, pulling out the spikes. The window opened. 
“I fixed them that way,” van Chuch said. 

Painfully Spike and Stubb measured the dimensions of 
the stateroom, the height of the door, the width of the 
bed. Took names of manufacturers of the furnishings, 
the engines, and the ship. Counted the boards in the 
floor and the cracks between. Finding one less crack than 
boards, however they counted from east to west or back 
again, excitement arose; till the old Colonel came and 
shooed them away. 

The officers rested from the methods of the great Holmes. 
The amateur sleuths stood about disconsolately. Squirmy 
went on the prowl for the Grady private stock. Men 
walked around the little gold-and-white saloon, talking in 
low voices about baseball, politics, and women. They 
plucked moist cigars from Grady’s humidors, clipped them 
with his clippers, lighted them with his matches. There 
was much fumbling of hands in pockets, much jerking of 
lapels. Every man seemed impelled to straighten his tie. 
They looked at their cigar points often. Van Chuch be¬ 
gan to assume a more commanding air as the day advanced. 


MORROW’S MORROW 


235 


He was Captain. This was his ship. Though it was old 
Tim Grady’s funeral. 

A sort of holiday. As Mrs. Higgs truly said, a man is 
not murdered every day; meaning, of course, that it’s not 
every day a man is murdered. Everything except the post- 
office closed in Biscayne. The old dog that had slept for 
seventeen years in Confederate Park arose, turned round, 
and slept again. 

Late in the day Gay Deleon dared to come down to the 
Thorn. “Get off!” old Dawn shouted to him, meeting him 
on the plank. “Don’t show your face around here!” 
And Deleon turned, and walked away. 

Mrs. Higgs consoled Rose Dawn in her new widowhood. 
Other consolers did not lack. The Thorn rocked emptily 
her snowy breast. A last year’s chrysalis. The butterfly 
was departed. 


XLIX. NIGHT WHISPERS 

* 4 'M” , VE called you in, Captain van Chuch, ” said old 
Dawn, “because you seem a pretty sensible man.” 
Van Chuch clicked his jaws and bowed. “And be¬ 
cause you were a friend, I think, to Mr. Grady.” Van 
Chuch knit his hands. “And because you are friend to 
Mrs. Grady. She needs friends now.” 

Van Chuch wiped his forehead. He pulled out his spare 
handkerchief, for he would need to wipe his forehead again. 

“Well, Sir,” said old Dawn, rubbing his hands and cast¬ 
ing oblique glances at van Chuch, “I want to give you a 
general survey of what we’re doing, since you represent 
the family till Mr. Padriac Grady arrives.” 

“Young Grady is coming?” 

“I kept the wires hot. Located him at last, through 
New York information, in Jacksonville. He’ll be down in 
a few hours—may be in town now. What sort of man is 
he?” 


236 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“To tell the truth, I never saw him,” van Chuch blurted. 

* 1 He wires me to use every means I can to get this thing 
cleared up. Here’s his wire—‘Have Anthony, Argus 
Agency, New York, take charge of case. No expense 
spared.’ So that’s that. If Anthony takes the case, it 
will be laid bare. To the last! No one spared, however 
high he is—or she. You’ve heard of Anthony?” 

“Yes,” nodded van Chuch, keeping his handkerchief 
to his forehead. 

“He never misses!” Old Dawn’s eyes were sharp. 

“So I’ve heard.” 

“He won’t this time. The thing’s too plain.” 

“Who killed him, Colonel?” van Chuch muttered. 

“Well, we’ll see. I found a will on the Thorn. Some 
people may be surprised by it. Cer-tain-ly surprised.” 

“Yes?” Van Chuch was curious. 

“I’ll have to keep that for the Grady lawyers. I’ve 
also located Mr. Higgleson Todd in Daytona. I’ll give the 
will to him.” 

“Anything else?” 

“Nothing much, Captain. I’ve found Mr. Grady’s cabin 
was robbed of a considerable sum of money—” 

“By the man who killed him!” 

The Colonel shrugged. “We’ll say that. I’m looking 
for Pete Lopez. ’Ve wired Jacksonville and Key West. 
We’ll get him!” Dawn drummed his fingers. “It was 
clever of you, being on the Thorn that night in time to get 
Tom!” 

Van Chuch wiped away the sweat. “What do you 
mean ? ’ ’ 

“We’re looking for Tom, too. We’ve got out rewards 
for the nigger, dead or alive. And God help him when 
he’s caught!” 

Van Chuch went out, still mopping his forehead. He 
felt limp. Birds singing in Confederate Park stirred no 
joy in him. He knew that he’d been sweated. 


NIGHT WHISPERS 


237 


“ Father knew it was coming!” Maveen whispered to 
Laurence. “He knew!” 

Her glances were superstitious. Unsteadily she held 
her cigaret. They sat on the Royal Poinsettia veranda, 
staring out at the Thorn. The day was clear and blue; 
but the superstitions of the Celt flourish in even the bluest 
paradises. 

“What could you have done, Maveen? What’s fated 
is fated, and nothing is going to stop it,” said Laurence. 

Anything else but fate, said other people in Biscayne. 
Eyes lingered on diverse suspected people. Heads nodded. 
Thicker than wedding rice were the whispers. 

“I do not say it,” declared Mrs. Higgs. “No, not I! 
But if you want my opinion and idea and suspicion 
breathed strictly in privacy and secrecy, I’ll say the Wein- 
voll woman did it!” 

Mrs. Weinvoll was not libeled by that. The curving 
finger of question beckoned to many greater than she. 
Old Dawn’s eyes were sharp. His black brows bent to¬ 
gether above fierce frowns. 

“That red-headed Grady girl told him in my own hear¬ 
ing she hoped he’d be murdered!” said Mrs. Weinvoll. 
“And if ’twasn’t her, ’twas that Deleon. There, there, 
Thusy! Don’t you cry, honey.” 

‘ 1 It was that Mallow creature, ’ ’ spoke Mrs. Hoag grimly, 
drawing her arms about her like a starved black vulture. 
She inhaled sharply. Her lips were bloodless. “That 
my daughter should be like her! ’ ’ 

“It must be nice to be Rose Dawn,” said Arethusa. 
11 The widow of a man with ten millions! ’ ’ 

“I wonder whom she’ll marry now?” thought little Bun- 
nie Hoag. She had no one to say it to, for her mother 
had locked her in her room. 

Could suspicion rest on the weeping head of beautiful 
Rose Dawn? Ask one of her dozen volunteer consolers, 
and meet his fists! Impossible eyes so blue could nourish 


238 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


murder. And if she did it, Sir, it was well done, Sir, and, 
by God! she was justified! 

“A man did it,” said Boosten Claude. “A woman 
would have shot him down at noon on the open street, 
trusting to God and an honest Southern jury. I’d ha’ 
shot him down myself,” said Boosten Claude. 

Gay Deleon had never seemed so sleek and polished. 
He walked alone, like a cat. He seemed to lick his 
mustaches, like a cat. He went on padded paws, like a 
cat. He was fat, like a cat. 

But where he walked, or where he supped, where he 
gambled, loved, or slept, always happened to bump into 
him Spike or Stubb. And the eyes of Colonel Dawn were 
growing blacker. Now dreadfully he scowled. The nets 
were closing in on Gay Deleon! 

“Tim Grady got what was coming to him,” Deleon bab¬ 
bled to every one. He itched to talk about the thing. “I 
tell you, Thornwood Clay, Tim Grady got what was coming 
to him!” And he did not mind the look of hate in Clay’s 
eyes. 

True. All men get what’s coming to them. If they 
don’t get it, it wasn’t coming to them. 

Coming from the Mimayne Club, where roulet is played, 
late that night, Deleon bumped into Laurence Spencer. 
“0, I say, Spencer!” Laurence slowed his walk, scowling. 

Here s that hundred I owe you, Spencer. My luck has 
turned at last! ’ ’ 

Laurence refused the money. His look was suspicious. 
Broadly he looked down at the sleek, smooth gambler. The 
two of them were almost of an age; but in some ways 
Deleon, for all his cunning, seemed a foolish babbling child. 
Laurence felt that puerility now. He hardened his face. 

“Ever hear the story of the dog which barked too 
much, Deleon?” he asked. Deleon shook his head. “You 
see, Deleon, it barked too much!” 

“Well, what’s the story? What’s the end of it?” 

“The dog was shot. That was the end of it.” 


NIGHT WHISPERS 


239 


Deleon drew back. “ What’s the pointf” 

‘‘No point at all,” said Laurence. “But people are 
wondering who was the dog that killed Tim Grady for the 
money in his cabin.” 

“I don’t follow, Spencer. First you talk of a howling 
dog* .And then of old Tim Grady, who every one knows 
was killed by his nigger Tom.” 

“This dog was killed because it barked too much, I say!” 

“That’s a black word, Spencer!” 

“A black dog killed Tim Grady. Take that, or leave 
it!” He turned, but Deleon still held forth the bills. 
Laurence lost control. “Your dirty money would rot my 
fingers off!” he said. 

Deleon took care to pocket the money. “I’ll pay you 
back for that some day, old timer!” 

“I’ll be on the look-out.” 

Laurence strode off in a passion. He had not gone three 
steps but he was sorry he had spoken. Time would come 
when he would be sorrier yet. 

And Deleon vanished out in the dark. Spike and Stubb 
hurried after him, but for a while they lost the track. 

In the shadows of palms by Black River banks murmurs 
rising. Dark words. Whispers in the night. “If you 
don’t stick by me, Deleon!—” “Be still, be still!”— 
‘ ‘ But if you think to do me dirt, Gay Deleon! ’ ’—‘ ‘ In the 
name of death!”—“I’ll tell old Dawn a story about Johnny 
Dawn that’ll make him shoot you through the heart!”— 
“Be still! We hang together.” 

Spike and Stubb rushed through the palms. All they 
found was Gay Deleon alone, nervously lighting a cigaret. 

L. QUAGMIRE DEEPS 

T EN miles south of Biscayne, ten miles west, lie the 
Everglades. Closer even than that, reaching with 
grassy quags to the very outskirts of the town. 
There hid black Tom. There, in the morasses. 


240 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Into his shoes oozed up sludgy mud, spreading out his 
toes, chafing the skin ragged raw. His belly was filled 
with cypress moss, peat, sticks, and mud. A purse (old 
Grady’s) with nearly a thousand dollars did not satisfy his 
hunger. 

Savannah and morass, coiling creek and scummy pool, 
hummock and bubbling bottomless quickmire, false trails 
upon the drowning mud. Palm and pine rioting for life, 
strangling like wrestlers, gripped to the death. Pern and 
marsh grass wallowing in the muck, blossoming quickly, 
rotting to quick decay. Black Tom stepped into a slough 
grass-covered, and felt the universe turn mud about him. 

Vines choked the cypress trees. Thicker they than a 
woman’s fingers, stronger than her arms. Softly, lethally, 
they kissed the branches of stagnant oaks. They clasped 
throttling arms about the palms. They sucked life from 
the gray cypresses. 

These are the cypress swamps. Above, thatched branches 
blotting out all light. About, ominous shadows. Beneath, 
cabbage palm and the sinking muck, stirred by the still 
slush! slush! of the things which crawl in it. The car¬ 
dinal flits through those dreadful solitudes, on vans which 
are flashes of scarlet. To few men, and but dimly to those 
few, are known the narrow trails which lead from isle 
to isle. Yet the copperhead and the moccasin find those 
dank depths grateful. 

These are the cypress swamps. Half a million years 
from now they will be peat and coal, crimson fires to warm 
men’s hearts. Mountains will be piled on them. But now 
they are the watery and the dissoluble, that chaos, that 
very undivided deep from which the lands are risen. Cre¬ 
ation in too fecund travail. Not more than this were once 
the tallest hills. Not more will they be again. 

Now Tom walks softly, and now he turns around, for 
death stalks him. He sinks. He groans. He clutches 
hard to ropy vines and hauls himself from sucking pools. 
Well for those mighty arms of his! 


QUAGMIRE DEEPS 


241 


A white stone road ran down between sea and swamp, 
not many hundred yards away. Rock upon coral rock was 
massed beneath it; it was solid as the mountains. Thun¬ 
dered along it roaring cars. Sounded the whining dogs, 
And men walked up and down, and talked. Tom could 
hear their laughter. 

That causey, that white stone road, man had hurled 
across the Cambrian bogs to show that he is man. To me 
(who am no engineer) it is a slap upon Creation’s face. 
A shouting oath: “I, Man, thus smite you on the face, 
Creation! I build my roads across your muck, Creation! 
I go where I damned please! ’ ’ 

Arrogant, to be sure. Blasphemous, to be sure. And 
blindly hardy. All of that was Lucifer. He was no stink¬ 
ing angel. 

All day the soggy rain fell, less pouring than hanging 
in the air. The south-east wind was hot from ocean. 
Raveled edges of a cloud blanket clung to the cypress tops. 
Nothing so wet, not even the utter sea, as tropic rain in 
winter. Its sad caresses (pale, odious lips of clinging 
love!) rot the flesh. Tom felt his feet. They were like 
the rotten grasses. 

A cardinal bird twittered dreamily beneath a roof of 
leaves. An old sot he, with draggled crest and drunken 
eye, y e t gay and valiant heart. He cocked his eye and 
looked below with a trilling note of fear. The slimy things 
within the deep crawled loathsomely, bending the marsh 
grass. Their unseen ripples writhed. This was their day 
of ecstasy. 

Seventh day of black Tom’s hunger; second day of rain. 
He stumbled on a mango tree and tore at its rotten fruit, 
cramming it two-fisted into his maw. “To eat! To eat!” 
sang the cardinal bird. Tom cursed it, throwing a stick 
toward the mocking cry. 

The cloud broke. Water crashed in tons. A splattering 
pool dripped constantly with the vile unweariness of 
water. Grasses rustled with sinuous voyagings. The 


242 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


blanket of cloud dropped down like a deflated balloon. 
Still the pool dripped unwearily. 

Near to him the firm stone road. Yet Tom did not ven¬ 
ture forth. He heard the voices of men who walked up 
and down, and far away the yap-yapping of lolling-tongued 
hounds. He cowered beneath a matted tree. Above him 
whined an airplane. It turned on drooping wing, steady 
as a swallow, and with loud roaring swept over him once 

again. Now in the distance it died away, with a noise 
like gnats. 

There in the cypress swamp hid black Tom. Tom Jef¬ 
ferson, M.D.: Doctor Thomas Jefferson! Ah, the beast 
lies in us all, learned Doctors! 

A thin streak of blue sky broke in the east, wonderfully 
clear as the eyes of Rose Dawn. As Tom watched, it took 
the shape of a knife. 


LI. IKE DUVAL’S TERRIBLE IDEA 

you’re back?” Arsen asked Anthony. “You 
didn’t stay long in New Orleans?” Anthony 
shook his head. “What happened, Tony?” 

4 ‘Nothing,” said Anthony darkly. “Tim Grady’s 
dead! ’’ 

“Great Greece! I read the newspapers. I’ll bet I was 
talking about that with Lieutenant MacErcher a day be¬ 
fore you knew about it. You made a lucky guess, Tony, 
when you said the old man would be killed.” 

Not too lucky, said Anthony softly. “But you can 
call it that.” 

“Hear Padriac Grady’s asked you to go down. He's 
doing all he can.” 

They’ve wired me, ’ ’ Anthony said after a pause. “ It’s 
hardly worth it.” He tied his shoe. “Queer they should 
call on me. Yes,” he said, “it’s queer!” 

Arsen knelt on the rug, stroking the dog face of the 
Sphinx with such soft purrings as: “Nice doggie! Down, 


IKE DUVAL’S TERRIBLE IDEA 


243 


Tige!” Such mannerisms he had picked up from Buddy 
Schermerhorn. They marked one for a wit in any assem¬ 
blage. Wit or nut. 

4 ‘ How are things in Orleans ? ’ ’ Arsen demanded. ‘ ‘ Llap- 
pen to meet my intimate friend— 0— Can’t think 

who. But I’ve got a lot of important friends there.” 

“I met Monsieur Vent-a-ventre,” said Anthony. 

“Ah, there’s one! I’ll bet he remembered me; huh? 
The devil! I can’t think just who he is.” 

“He’s a coon,” said Anthony, with a mocking glance. 

Arsen stamped up and down in a rage, casting wrothy 
glances at Anthony. He could not endure scorn. An¬ 
thony was indifferent to Arsen’s rage. The reporter 
sulked, straightening his tie. 

“Where’s your specimen of the wild Griinwald praline?” 
Arsen went on, when he’d walked his anger away. ‘ ‘ Where 
is the man-eating Sajerac cocktail, domesticated in New 
Orleans alone?” He spoke brightly, in the best Scher¬ 
merhorn manner. “Of course you met the inebriated 
Southern gentleman who falls on the necks of perfect 
strangers, begging them not to call him names because he 
is a Southern gentleman. One once accosted me in the 
Babylon, and pursued me up and down elevators, weeping: 
‘Don’t dare to call me a son-of-a-female-hound, because I’m 
a Southern gentleman. ’ Old Tiff Bonnell was going to have 
Ike throw him out. But I discovered the Southern gentle¬ 
man was Boosten Claude, a friend of my friends, the 
Gradys. So he’s one of my intimate friends now.” 

Arsen was better pleased with himself. ‘When do you 
leave for Biscayne, Tony?” 

“I’m not going!” Anthony said harshly. “I don’t 
care whom they hang for killing old Tim Grady! 

Arsen narrowed his eyes. “I’ll bet I can tell you right 
this minute who killed the old man,” he said. “I ve put 
my intelligence on this.” 

“Never saw a reporter yet who didn t think he 
could do anything better than any other man, ’ ’ Anthony 


244 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


growled. “ You 're always telling us how to do it.” 

“You can hear it from Lieutenant MacErcher and Ur¬ 
ban Wiggs that Rose Dawn tried to poison him once. The 
whole world knows about it—” 

You lie, you fool!” Anthony shouted, springing up. 

For an instant Arsen could not make sound, Anthony’s 
wrath was so unexpected. “Give me the lie, will you!” 
Arsen stuttered, hating Anthony more for calling him a 
fool than he could hate him for any other cause. “By 

God! You 11 not give me the lie! 111 show you some¬ 
thing!” 

Anthony swayed forward. “Who touches the name of 
Rose Dawn touches death!” 

"Wigley Arsen walked out of Anthony’s door hurriedly, 
cursing his intimate friend, the devil. 

Down town the Morning Mist building was a tower of 
lights. Great presses snarled and roared. Slushing 
through the snow from the Babylon Hotel, all the blood of 
his body wrathily rushing to his head, Arsen’s feet got 
cold. He began to sneeze. “Hoo-ch! Hoo-ch!” 

Entering the Mist offices, he sent out a copy boy with 
one of Dr. Spencer’s prescriptions to be filled. “Hoo-ch! 
Hoo-ch! Maig id snabby! ’ ’ Arsen commanded. The copy 
boy returned with a bottle of malted milk tablets. 

“Dis is a fide dig!” cried Arsen, disgustedly looking at 
the bottle. “A fide dig for idibate fred to gib be!” He 
meant to say it was a fine thing for an intimate friend to 
give him. He hurled the bottle to the floor. 

A large-headed young fellow came in and began ham¬ 
mering a typewriter. “What’s matter, Wig—scooped 
again?” he asked kindly. On top of his big head was a 
^. y to^^sn hat, which he scratched as though it were a 
disease. “Here y’ are, Bill,” he said to the weary city 
editor, unrolling a sheet from his typewriter. “Another 
girl gone and drowned herself.” 

. BiU nodded - “All right, Dubby.” He went on read¬ 
ing copy. 


IKE DUVAL’S TERRIBLE IDEA 


245 


11 Sgoobed! ’ ’ Arsen repeated angrily. He scorned 
Dubby, whose father was no more than a head-waiter and 
whose sister worked for her living. “You gub!” 

“Fine thing to call a white man!” said Dubby in¬ 
dignantly. “Don’t speak Yiddish to me.” The 
hands of Dubby, of one of the proletaire, of a fellow 
not Arsen’s intimate friend, pulled the Arsenic hair. 
“That’s good for gubs,” said Dubby. “Hab you gaught 
a gold?” 

A boy with pimpled face and gangling legs came hopping 
out of the managing editor’s office. From hair to shoes 
he was one long, unillumined smear of ink. A grin shone 
forth in the midst of the inky pimples. 

“Out, damned spot!” shrieked Dubby. 

“Mac wants to see you, Wig,” said the pimples impu¬ 
dently. 

“You get the pink slip, Wig,” Dubby rejoiced. “The 
razzo!” 

“The bum’s rush,” said the animated ink. “Mac’s got 

his shoes all polished up for you.” 

“Get oud!” Arsen commanded sourly. “You ibudet 

biece ob butty! ” 

Editor MacErcher was always formal to Arsen. “Close 
the door please, Mr. Arsen. I want to speak to you in con¬ 
fidence.” Arsen shut out the clack of the city room, the 
sight of Bill and Dubby. “I’m going to send you to Bis- 
cayne, Mr. Arsen. We believe big news is just about ready 
to break in the Tim Grady matter.” 

Arsen stroked his mustache, nodding and blowing his 

nose. 

“We’ve got word confidentially— 0, I got it from my 

brother, Lieutenant MacErcher, and he got it from my 
niece Jennie— Women will talk— We’ve got word in¬ 
teresting things may be turned up about Rose Dawn. 
We’ll play it big!” 

“Whole world dows she dried to boisod Tib Grady, 
said Arsen. 



246 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


All right, Mr. Arsen,” said MacErcher grimly. “Go 
to it!” 

As Arsen returned to the city room Bill was reading the 
paragraph Dubby had handed him. Bill’s weary face was 
deeply lined. He jabbed a pencil at his desk. Again and 
again, till the pencil point broke. 

What’s the matter, Bill?” asked Dubby, pushing back 
his little green hat. “Ain’t it right? I say, ain’t it 
right ? ’ ’ 

Nothing much of news in that paragraph. Only a sen¬ 
tence or so telling how a girl had been found in East 
River. Dark red curls; age about twenty; stocky build; 
she had been dressed in yellow frock, fawn stockings, and 
plush imitation sable coat. In her pocket had been found 
a note addressed to Gay Deleon, Park Avenue, the contents 
of which the police had not divulged. The girl’s last name 
was unknown; the street knew her as Dot. Plain suicide. 

Bill jabbed down his broken pencil. “I had a sister,” 
he said in strained whisperings. “I had a sister Dorothy. 
If ever— If ever— By my God! If ever I meet Gay 
Deleon—” He gasped, snapping his pencil in two. “At 
night, or in the morning, if I meet Gay Deleon—!” Bill 
sprang up, banging his desk. “Alone, or with a dozen 
men about him!—if I meet Gay Deleon, though I have but 

my hands!—if I meet up with Deleon !—I will—I shall 

I ought to— It would be a good thing if I_” 

He sat down. Dubby and Arsen watched him curiously. 
“I’ve broken my pencil,” muttered Bill, and picked up 
another. He poked at his desk again, as though he knew 
no more heroic action. 

I got a sister,” said Dubby. “But Mary tends to her 
own business, and I tend to mine. If she gets in trouble, 
she’ll get out. Ain’t that right?” 

“That’s right,” whispered Bill. 

No, said Dubby. “I mean the story I wrote about 
that Dot. Ain’t that right?” 

“It’s right,” whispered Bill. 


IKE DUVAL’S TERRIBLE IDEA 


247 


When Arsen bought his railroad reservations for Bis- 
cayne, a man stood behind him in line whom he recognized. 
The stern jowls, the black derby, the belted green overcoat 
marked Solemn Ike Duval. Arsen would have turned 
without recognition, but Ike tapped him on the sleeve. 

“Mr. Arsen,” commanded Ike. Ike didn’t like the lo¬ 
quacious reporter. He liked few men. But he had learned 
by devious ways that Arsen had quarreled with Anthony. 
“Mr. Arsen, I’m going to Biscayne, too. On my own. 
I’m not with the Argus people any more. Didn’t like 
their way o’ doing business.” 

“Come along,” said Arsen. “I’ve heard poor old Tim 
Grady speak highly of you, Ike.” 

That night on the Gold Express Ike Duval emerged from 
long taciturnity. “Mr. Arsen, Anthony didn’t go to New 
Orleans I” 

“Why, he told me so himself—” 

“He lied ! I’ve traced him to Jacksonville, where he dis¬ 
appeared. But a man with amber glasses got off the Gold 
Express at Biscayne ! ’ ’ 

“I don’t follow,” said Arsen. 

“Anthony is nervy,” said Ike. “Nervy as they make 
’em.” 

“My intimate friend says—” Arsen stammered, know¬ 
ing not to what intimate friend he referred, or what the 
intimate friend had said. “What do you think? ’ he cried. 

“What’s your idea, Ike?” ^ 

Ike closed his stone jowls. “I don’t think till I know,” 
he said. And after further silence. “But I do know one 
thing, Mr. Arsen.” 

“What’s that?” 

“Anthony popped up out of nowhere two years ago. 
No one had ever heard of him before. Just like that, 
out of nowhere. That’s queer enough to think about! An¬ 
thony made a name for himself by taking chances on any¬ 
thing. No man will say he’s not brave. I’ve seen him 
walk square up to two armed yeggs, and knock ’em cold 


248 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


with his fists. Afraid of him. You don’t know what he’d 
do. Where did Anthony come from? Who is he? It’s 
not natural a man comes that way out of nowhere, Mr. 
Arsen. Who was Anthony Anthony before?” 

“That’s so,” Arsen mused. “I met him first at the 
Astors’— No. Let’s see. My friend— No. It was old 
Tiff Bonnell introduced us, one night in the Babylon. I 
(I think) was drunk,” said Arsen. “But ever since he’s 
been one of my intimate friends. That is, till lately,” 
added Arsen. 

“And I know another thing, Mr. Arsen,” said Ike Duval, 
after a long period of pondering. He ground his teeth. 
“Not that I hold grudge against Anthony, you understand, 
for kicking me out of the Argus Agency, you understand. 
But I want to see justice. And I have my own thoughts! ’ ’ 

What do you know, Ike?” Arsen asked, shivering in¬ 
side himself. 

Anthony Anthony was watching Dawnrose the night 
Tim Grady was married. Called me off the watch himself. 
Told me to go on home, there was nothing to worry about.” 

‘ ‘ I remember, ’ ’ Arsen whispered. ‘ ‘ I remember! Mrs. 
Higgs gave a cry when Rose Dawn was being married. 
She looked at the window, and she saw—” 

“What did she see!” 

“Nothing,” said Arsen stupidly. 

And the Gold Express roared on. He watched the face 
of Ike Duval in the half lights of the smoking car grow 
stony cold. 


LII. TIM GRADY’S MONEY 

B Y the edge of Confederate Park stands Biscayne 
jail, a battlement of porous gray stone. Not much 
sun shines here, though a great deal of heat. Old 
Colonel Dawn’s offices are in the upper story. 

Spike and Stubb sit on a bench at the jail entrance, 


TIM GRADY’S MONEY 


249 


whittling. They have, at one time or another, whittled 
almost all the bench away. What remains is only a narrow 
plank of initials superimposed on carved hearts, of carved 
ladies dressed in stockings and hats, of arrows, ships, un- 
symmetrical horses enormously haunched, palm trees, and 
various vulgar symbols. In labor consumed that bench 
has cost Biscayne taxpayers about seven thousand dollars. 
As art it is not worth it. 

But it is dear to Spike and Stubb. Eft and anon they 
spit. 

“They’s something going on in the Colonel’s office,” 
says Spike.—“With that lawyer Higgleson Todd,” Stubb 
continues.—“Higgleson Todd is a queer sort of cuss,” says 
Spike. “Seen that blond stenographer of his?”—“Ste¬ 
nographer, my foot! ’ ’ Stubb says .—‘ 1 My neck! ’ ’ says 
Spike. 

“I wisht they’d catch Lopez or the nigger,” says Stubb. 
—“Ain’t seen a lynching since I was a pup,” says Spike. 

Stubb stretches out his thick arms in a yawn, swelling 
his barrel chest. Spike fishes for a toothpick, tosses it in 
the air, catches it between his teeth. Slowly he chews it. 
His bristled scalp moves back and forth. His saw-tooth 
mustache moves sideways. 

Old Colonel Dawn had summoned Padriac Grady, Hig¬ 
gleson Todd, and Rose to his office. Padriac was silent, 
twining his w T hite forelock nervously, glancing beneath his 
hand at his father’s widow. Higgleson Todd, wiping his 
glasses, wiping his big bald head, stared at her also. 

“I found this lying beside Mr. Grady,” said old Dawn, 
handing over a sheet of paper. “It’s for you to read, Mr. 
Todd.” 

Gravely Higgleson Todd adjusted his glasses. “Well!” 
he stammered dully. Quickly his glance ran down the 
page. “It’s a joke!” he said. “You don’t take this seri¬ 
ously, Colonel— Your name, Sir ? Colonel Dawn! ” 

Rose startled, looking at the old man. She had never 
known his name before. With widening glance she be- 


250 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


held his black brows, his lean face, the determined droop of 
his mouth. A resemblance, dreadful as though the dead 
had suddenly grown old, but breathed f 

“Who are you!” w r hispered Rose involuntarily. 

I m head of the police, ma’m, ” said old Dawn omi¬ 
nously. 

That damned Wiggs!” Todd snarled, shaking the 
paper. This is his dirty work! I drew up a will; Grady 
signed it. It’ll stand in any court. It’s sound enough. 
But this thing! I’ll finish it—” 

“It’s the last testament of Timothy Grady, Mr. Todd. 
I’d not advise you to tear it up,” said the Colonel. 

“No. Didn’t intend to. You’re right.” 

The last will of old Tim Grady. The last joke of the 
dead. A typewritten sheet, drawn up secretly by cunning 
old Wiggs, its signature scratched off in haste by old Tim 
Grady in his last moment, with the red moon beaming 
through the porthole, with the heavy knife poised above his 
heart! Sharp and soon had struck that knife. The signa¬ 
ture was hardly finished. 

Words from the shadows. Terrified chaffering of a lost 
soul to buy fare back from the road of the damned. The 
very authentic words of old Tim Grady, as he had dictated 
them to Wiggs with the fear of death upon him, fear of 
old Thornwood Clay upon him, fear of the red moon upon 
him, while the Thorn lay ready for the sea. “I, Timothy 
Grady, of New York—” Of where, Tim Grady, when 
Higgleson Todd read those words to your young wife? 

I found it on his bed beneath a mess of papers and 
books,” said old Dawn. “Looks like he had that ready, 
and signed it at the last moment because of something 
which had just happened. Why should he sign this will 

Mrs. Grady? Who tried to stop his hand?” He bent his 
black brows at her. 

Rose Dawn twisted a handkerchief. 

Todd, calm as a square granite block, but with teeth 
which clicked and ground, read the paper through_ 


TIM GRADY’S MONEY 


251 


u Being in sound mind and body, do hereby will, devise, 
and bequeath—” (“The hand of Wiggs!” Todd mut¬ 
tered.)—“To my son Padriac all my interests in Grady 
Pictures, my home Dawnrose, my liquors—” (“The voice 
of Wiggs!” Todd snarled.)—“To Maveen, nothing but the 
good sense I gave her, having supplied her liberally in 

— ” (“The wit of Wiggs!’* Todd frothed.) —“To Rose 

Dawn Grady, nothing but her dower interest in my real 
estate— ’ ’ 

Todd slammed the will on Dawn’s desk. “0, that 
damned Wiggs!” he shouted. “Everything else goes to 
Bellbender for St. Cecil’s Church!” 

“What does it mean?” asked Padriac Grady. 

“It means nothing! Your father was non compos men¬ 
tis! He was crazy as a loon! I ’ll smash this flat! (That 
Wiggs!) And here’s a lot more about ‘atonement and for¬ 
giveness ’; about ‘ the gates of Hell shall not prevail ’; about 
‘pray for my soul’; about ‘chimes’; about ‘merciful, for¬ 
giving God.’ Wigg’s smooth words! Those are hellish 
fine things to put in a legal will! Bellbender and Wiggs! 
St. Cecil’s! Bellbender’ll throw Tim Grady’s money away 
on charity! I wrote out a will that would give everything 
to Rose Dawn!” 

“Well, there it stands!” said old Dawn grimly. 
“You’re the lawyer. But that —” he shook his finger at 
the will—“f/taf’s the law! Guard it!” 

“0, sure!” said Todd savagely. “A fine thing you’ve 
stirred up! Wiggs will fight me if I ever try to break it. 
And he, damn him! And him! I’d like to kick him ! He 
thinks he’s such a shark at golf.” Todd wiped his neck. 
“Mrs. Grady has no money to get her rights, Colonel. 
It’s vile injustice. Tim Grady was drunk when he signed 
it. He was crazy! I’ll break it on grounds of incompe¬ 
tency ! I ’ll prove he was insane! ’ ’ 

Old Dawn frowned. “He was sane enough to get mar¬ 
ried ; wasn’t he ? ” 

“And that’s the criminal injustice of it!” Todd roared, 


252 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


smacking his palms. “This poor girl married him ex¬ 
pecting to be treated honorably. Is all she gets her dower 
rights at common law ? This poor girl, ’ ’ roared Todd, pat¬ 
ting Rose’s knee, “will get her rights, if Higgleson Todd 
knows law! This poor girl,” crooned Todd, taking her 
limp hand and stroking it, “will know she has one friend 
on earth! This poor girl,” he sobbed, “will get her 
rights ! ’ ’ He patted her shoulder. 

“Enough of that!” mouthed Padriac Grady. 

“Enough of what, Mr. Grady? Enough of what, Sir?” 
cried Todd, releasing Rose’s hand and sliding his chair 
away. “Why, Sir, you startled me!” He felt his collar. 
“I thought it was the voice of your father!” 

Rose Dawn stood slowly to her feet. “Is this what you 
called me in for, for that?” she whispered. “Why I—I 
w r ould not touch one cent of Mr. Grady’s money! I’d 
sooner work my fingers to the bone.” Was it acting or 
nature that she sobbed? “It’s enough to be free,” she 
whispered. 

Beyond the door Spike and Stubb tried to bar the en¬ 
trance of a puffy lady. Mrs. Higgs poked them out of 
her path with valiant elbows. “I can’t go in where they’re 
scheming and plotting and planning and concorking some¬ 
thing against us!” she shouted. “Vamoose! Whose 
funeral is this?” 

She broke through the door. ‘ ‘ What’s this! ” she yelled; 
so loud that certainly only her own voice could she hear. 
“What’s this I hear?” 

“What do you hear, ma’m?” retorted the old Colonel. 
He held that all white women should be regarded as ladies 
till they begin to scream; but he did not like Mrs. Higgs. 
“Speak more quietly, please, ma’m.” 

“I’ll peak more squietly!” howled Higgs, losing all no¬ 
tion of the formation of words. “What’s this!” She 
made a snatch at the will. Old Dawn barred her, his 
grim finger pointing to the door. “What are you stick¬ 
ing and picking and pawing and poking your ugly old 


TIM GRADY’S MONEY 


253 


finger at me for? Don’t you know better manners than 
to point at a lady?” 

“Out!” commanded Colonel Dawn. 

“What are they doing to us, dearie?” the woman de¬ 
manded of Rose, paying no heed to the old Colonel’s stern 
command. 

“Grady’s money goes to Bellbender and Padriac,” Todd 
growled. “Rose is frozen clean. That damned Wiggs!” 

‘ ‘ O—o! ’ ’ Mrs. Higgs drew out the exclamation. She 
wrinkled her little blue eyes. “0—o so—o!” sang she, 
with many a sonorous tremor. “This is your doings, Pa¬ 
driac Grady! I’ve suspected and watched your sneaking, 
smooth, hypercritical ways! You’ll go where Tim Grady 
lies if you don’t watch out—” 

“Mother!” 

Something like steel gripped Higgs’s arms. Before she 
could say Jack Robinson three thousand times, the door 
closed behind her, and she was out. She kicked and ham¬ 
mered at the panels. Round little Stubb and lofty Spike 
gripped her fast by the elbows. They led her away. 

For a long time after Todd, Padriac, and Rose, too, had 
gone forth, old Colonel Dawn sat motionless. The mem¬ 
ory of Rose’s lovely face yet lingered, smiled at him from 
the shadows, drowsed in cobweb corners. This was the 
woman brave John Dawn had loved above all other women, 
had loved alone of women. Old Dawn pulled a picture 
out of his desk. 

Spike and Stubb, hearing no answer to their knocking, 
found him with his head on his arms. 

LIII. DELEON BITES IRON 

4 4 a H, Mrs. Higgs,” said Mrs. Weinvoll. “Do you 
/\ know that Hoag woman?” 

£ “I know of her,” returned Ma Higgs dis¬ 

tantly, not inclined to unbosom herself too freely to Mrs. 
Weinvoll, of Milwaukee. Their social spheres were far 


254 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


apart. “I‘know of her,” Higgs repeated haughtily. “I 
don’t know anything good or decent or respectable about 
her, ’ ’ she admitted. 

“Neither do I,” said Mrs. Weinvoll, ruffling her kanga¬ 
roo body. 

“She lets her daughter run wild and free,” said Higgs, 
“like I’d never let no daughter of mine. You know Bun- 
nie runs around with that Thornwood Clay? He’s no 
good. I knew his father. I helped push him out of my 
Westchester country home, Dawnrose, last Christmas Eve. 
Isn’t that disgrace enough?” 

“With Thornwood Clay?” said Mrs. Weinvoll. “But I 
thought— ’ ’ 

“Many the time! And I’ve saw her running around 
with Deleon in McGinty’s blue racer many and many the 
night. Ah, once I caught them kissing!” 

Weinvoll nodded. “Shame to her and her mother! 
Shame to her mother that don’t keep better watch! I 
don’t see how she bears the light o’ day!” 

“A mother’s duty never ends,” said Higgs. “Mine 
hasn’t with my Rose. Just once I closed my eyes, and she 
up and off and married that John Dawn. Let him rest 
well. I say no evil of the dead. But it was her loving ma 
married her to old Tim Grady. My dearie has me to thank 
for that, that I made her wife to old Tim Grady! Even 
if she was not wife to him one single hour.” 

4 No, ma’m?” said Weinvoll. And her eyebrows raised. 

They talked of much which ladies may, and much which 
ladies mayn t. Ma Higgs unbent, for her snobbery was 
not deep. Too many snobs had snouted her for her to feel 
uppish very long. 

Milwaukee bent over creakingly to tap Moline’s knee. 
Faded brown head met streaky yellow head, combining as 
HN0 3 . Those gold curls of Rose Dawn, how they had 
faded to Ma Higg’s streaky yellow! Her clear blue eyes 
to those dim small pupils! 


DELEON BITES IRON 


255 


The voices of the ladies were like tintinnabulation of the 
prophetic bells of Hell. Two minds with but a single 
thought, two tongues which beat as one. As in the Golden 
Age, the lion lay down with the lamb, the hyena with the 
goat. Men find such concord only in liquor, women in 
talk. 

“No, ma’m!” said Higgs. “I’ve watched her well. 
The pretty dear!” 

“So much like her mother,” murmured Weinvoll. 

“Indeed, we could be mistaken for sisters,” said Higgs 
proudly. 

Lovely, lovely Rose Dawn, most beautiful of women! 
And you, you old buzzard, old Higgs! 

“True you can pat yourself on the back, Mrs. Higgs, 
for you have a wonderful daughter, and she’s all due to 
you. But that Hoag woman! Do you know where her 
daughter was on that night?” 

“I know. I saw her dancing with that Deleon. 0, 
didn’t she simper and smile and grin and giggle and twirk 
and twiggle to him though!” 

“But you and your daughter left early, Mrs. Higgs. 
Well might Mrs. Hoag wish she’d done the like and the 
same! Has she no mother’s care at all, Mrs. Higgs? 
Strict she pertends to be, Mrs. Higgs. But if my daughter 
was what her daughter is, Mrs. Higgs, I’d lay me down 
and die!” 

“What did Bunnie do?” Mrs. Higgs gasped, brightening. 
“I see her like as if she was before me, in her pale, light- 
colored, white gown; and with a white rose in her hair like 
any boughten woman. Often have I watched her sneaking 
in and out, a-taking kisses from that Deleon. I steered 
my Rose away from him in time! ’ ’ 

“No, Bunnie was all in red that night,” said Weinvoll. 
“Thusy was wearing white. You might have known it, 
Mrs. Higgs, if you’d but seen the color of that gown! 
Stark red! Naked red! But was her mother watching 


256 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


her, Mrs. Higgs? No! Her mother was cutting up at 
the table with Mr. Grady, and I had to sit there myself 
to keep her straight!” 

“So prim and stern and black Mrs. Hoag looks,” said 

Higgs. “And you say, Mrs. Weinvoll, that her daugh¬ 
ter is—?” 

“True word you spoke, Mrs. Higgs! I don’t talk about 
any one behind their backs. But it is true as I am breath¬ 
ing that Bunnie Hoag was out that night with Deleon in 
a place which shall not be mentioned! People heard her 
crying down by the shore. ‘ Gay! 0 Gay! ’ she was cry¬ 

ing by the river banks.” 

‘ ‘ 1 heard her! ’ ’ said Higgs. ‘ ‘ I heard her myself before 
old Tim came home. ‘0 Gay! 0 Gay!’ she was crying, 
like as if her heart would break.” 

“True enough,” said Weinvoll. “And I did my Chris¬ 
tian duty and told her mother of it. Though the little 
minx denied it bald-faced, yet it’s true. 0, how her mother 
was dumbfounded! 0, how she put on airs! Threw up 
her hands! No daughter of hers, 0, no! Of course not! 
That’s what they all say,” sniffed Weinvoll. “But I tell 
you again, Mrs. Higgs, that if my daughter was what her 
daughter is, Mrs. Higgs, I’d lay me down and die!” 

“What’s she done with her?” cried Higgs. “I thought 
I saw her only the other minute playing tennis with that 
young Larry Spencer.” 

Weinvoll pressed her hands in her lap. “No, indeed, 
Mrs^Higgs. Her mother’s locked her up in her room, and 
won’t let her speak to man or soul. Too late! Too late! 
She’s awoken to her duty as a mother far too late!” 

Thank God ’twill never be said about me!” breathed 
Higgs. 

Speak of angels! ’ ’ gasped Weinvoll. ‘ ‘ Shu-h! Shu-h! 
Here she comes! ’ ’ 

Gaunt and tall, her black frock flapping about her 
bones, Mrs. Dusty Hoag approached on the veranda. Her 
daik countenance was tragic as the demons. Her hands 


DELEON BITES IRON 


257 


shook. Her straggling dark hair looked as though she had 
torn at it. 

“Yes, indeed, Mrs. Higgs, a lovely bright day!” Wein- 
voll cried loudly. 

“A day of Heaven!” cried Mrs. Higgs, equally loud. 

Being both well-bred ladies, they would not let Mrs. 
Hoag know they had called her names behind her back. 

“Have you seen Bunnie?” cried Mrs. Hoag hysterically. 

“No, indeed!” said Weinvoll, startling in vast surprise, 
as though she’d forgotten such a person as the Hoag per¬ 
son took breath. “Goodness, how you startled me! "We 
haven’t seen anything of you in such a time. I was just 
saying to Mrs. Higgs I wondered where you was. You 
and your daughter—” a not silent sneer here—“I’ve 
noticed *ve been keeping pretty much to your rooms.” 

“Where is Bunnie!” cried Mrs. Hoag distractedly. 

“I never knew ’er, saw ’er, nor heard of ’er,” said 
Higgs loftily. 

“ Where is Bunme!” screamed Mrs. Hoag. 

She fell back against a veranda chair, groping weakly. 
A paper fell from her hand. Mrs. Higgs delicately picked 
it up and read it. 

“Bunnie ain’t in her room?” Mrs. Weinvoll asked in 
good-natured concern, feeling a little sorry for Mrs. Hoag 
now. “I thought you’d keep a better eye on her now, 
Mrs. Hoag, after all that’s happened.” 

“She’s gone,” whispered Hoag, staring with haggard, 
weary glances. ‘ ‘ She’s gone! No one has seen her! ’ ’ 

“Gracious!” said Weinvoll pityingly. “I knew it,. 
She’s run off with some good-for-nothing fellow. Why 
don’t you ask Mr. Spencer or Mr. Clay? They’ve guo 
rooms on both sides of yours. Maybe she’s run off with 
that long drink Schermerhorn. Or with that Lopez the 
police are looking for.” 

Mrs. Hoag didn’t listen to these sympathetic suggestions. 
“Read that!” she said with a hard cough, pointing to the 
paper which Mrs. Higgs had already read. ‘ ‘ She left it, ’ ’ 


258 


ONCE IN A BED MOON 


said Hoag, pressing her hand to her scrawny throat. 

Such a quick temper she had, so brave and wild like 
her father! She’s gone!” 

Weinvoll read: “Good-by, Mother. I loved you, 
Mother. I’ve always been a good girl, Mother—I tried to 
be. O, I loved you, Mother. Say some prayers for me. 
Give my beaded georgette to Cousin Sally and my picture 
in the little frame to Larry Spencer. Good-by to you, 
my Mother! ’ ’ 

Mrs. Weinvoll fanned herself. “You don’t think—?” 
she queried meaningly. Back and forth she rocked on her 
broad hips. “Surely you can’t suspect, Mrs. Hoag—?” 

“There!” sobbed Mrs. Hoag, pointing with black bony 
arm to the river. “There!” she shrieked at the treacher¬ 
ous dark waters. “She never could abide punishment. Al¬ 
ways so quick and fierce and hot she was that way. 0 
God, God!” 

^ Higgs twirked her neck. “It’s better so,” said she. 
“Them who can’t manage their own children, God will 
carry them away.” 

Ah, Mrs. Hoag,” said Weinvoll, “a true word Mrs. 
Iliggs has spoke! Better had she died in all her pretty 
innocence, than that she is what she is! I speak plainly.” 

“ 0 my Bunnie! 0 my little black-eyed baby! I didn’t 

mean to hurt your little feelings! I thought it was for the 
best. How I’ve watched—how I’ve prayed! How bright 
she was, and gay, and filled with God’s own deviltry.” 

“You’d better notify the police,” said Higgs calmly. 
“Tell old Dawn.” 

“I tried to do all that’s right for her,” Mrs. Hoag 
sobbed. How did I fail ? WLere did I shirk my duty ? 

I was so careful of her, but the wildness was in her. I’ve 
punished her enough. I’ve whipped her when she was a 
little thing until my arms were tired. What did I do 
wrong? How have I failed?” 

She stumbled away, sobbing with hoarse and foolish 


DELEON BITES IRON 


259 


gasps. Her bony neck was stretched. She mopped her 
raw eyes. 

Laurence Spencer and Arethusa Weinvoll came up the 
veranda steps, tired and laughing, tennis rackets in their 
hands. Arethusa’s little freckled eyes winked coyly at the 
big young man, her little freckled nose wiggled affection¬ 
ately. Milk-white her arms and neck. And when she sat 
down in a veranda chair, above her rolled socks her knees 
showed milk-white. 

Mrs. Higgs spied them first, Mrs. Weinvoll’s back being 
turned. “Right there before our eyes she is, that little 
wretch! Look there at her! Many and many s the time 
I’ve seen her out with Deleon. You don’t need two looks 
at her to know what she is! It’s wrote all over her face. 
If I had daughter like that, I’d lock her out the door! 
I’d turn her to the gutter and the street! ’ ’ 

Indignantly bustling, Weinvoll turned. “A true word, 

Mrs. Higgs—” 

Her soul writhed in racking fires. It was to her daugh¬ 
ter Mrs. Higgs was sneeringly pointing. Could it be 
possible ? Did this odious old Higgs hussy point to Thusy ? 
Did not Hell gape? Was she not pitched down to Tar- 

tsrus ^ 

“That is my daughter, Mrs. Higgs!” hissed Weinvoll. 
“Wart!” cried Mrs. Higgs, losing control of her tongue. 
“Why, I have seen her with my own eyes, the sneaking 

little minx— ” ? ? 

“My daughter you speak of, woman!’ 

“No credit to you in that!” snapped Mrs. Higgs. 

“I can thank my God,” said Weinvoll, wrapping her 
shoulder-blades about herself, “that she is above suspicion! 
Yes!” she shrilled. “Each night I get down on my knees 
beside my bed, and thank Him that she is pure! Which 
is more than can be said about Rose Dawn, Mrs. Higgs! 
“Wart?” cried Mrs. Higgs, frothing and foaming. 

“Wart? Wart? Wart?” 


260 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Mrs. Weinvoll could have no more bent down on her fat 
knees in prayer than could the Woolworth building. And 
had she bent no power known, not seven steam derricks, 
not all the king’s horses and all the king’s men, not that 
Archimedean lever which boasted to move the earth, could 
have lifted her up again. But still she repeated defiantly, 
snortling through her nose. 

“Yes, each night I get down on my knees and thank 
Him that Thusy is not like Rose Dawn. She isn’t seen 
flirting with Higgleson Todd or her own step-son.” 

“Wart!” howled Higgs. “Wart do you say about my 
Rose! ’ ’ 

“0, how surprised you are!” jeered Weinvoll. “0, 
how flabbergasted! 0, my gracious! Doesn’t the whole 
world know that Deleon was on the Thorn all night the 
night Tim Grady was murdered?” 

Ma Higgs was within one breath of death by apoplexy, 
a thing fashionable but unpleasant. She tore with claw¬ 
ing fingers at the air. She swelled like a toadfish and 
grunted like a hogfish. Her Medusan locks rose hissing, 
each one a bleached yellow snake. 

“And doesn’t the whole world know she tried to poison 
him ■ ?” panted Weinvoll. “Doesn’t the whole world know 
what she is ? How dare you speak about my Thusy! ’ ’ 

Had not Clay and Maveen come on the veranda this 
moment, it is likely that Moline, Kansas, would have 
launched itself like a tiger at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, tear¬ 
ing at throat and eyes and hair, and the two cities fallen 
choking to the dust, gripped in that mortal fate which 
overtook the two calico cats. 

Laurence had gone to his room to tub after leaving Are- 
thusa. He heard his door open. Wrapping a towel about 
him, he stuck his nose from the bathroom. 

Spencer, for the love of God! Can you lend me some 
money?” 

Gay Deleon had crept in cautiously. He leaned against 
the door, his shoulders wilting. No color in his cheeks. 


DELEON BITES IRON 


261 


Nervously he fumbled with his little mustache. He was 
only a poor little snipe in decent clothes, all the fire, scorn, 
audacity, and mercilessness taken from him. His evil hour 
had come on him, as it had come on Thorn Clay, on Tim 
Grady, on Dot; as it has come on many another soul. His 
evil hour! Yet he’d know worse. 

A poor little snipe in decent clothes. Splendid the 
polish of his hair; scented his hands; suave his gestures; 
delicate his skin. None the less, a snipe. 

“I lost my last cent in the Mimayne Club, Spencer! 0, 
the black luck! I’ve got to have money. I’m ,good, 
Spencer. I offered to pay you before. Listen to me, 
Spencer!” 

Laurence put on a robe and came slowly out of the bath¬ 
room. His looks were narrow. 

“Pete—a friend of mine wants money!” cried Deleon 
distractedly. “I want enough to get out of this damned 
place, Spencer! Lend me railroad fare. You’re a good 
fellow, Spencer. I always liked you, Spencer.—Spencer!” 

“So you’re going to leave us?” Laurence asked omi¬ 
nously. 

“I don’t like the way people act,” whispered Deleon. 
“No, I don’t like it! I want to leave Biscayne. A hun¬ 
dred, Spencer. Only a hundred! ’ ’ 

Laurence paced slowly across his room. “I won’t talk 
to you,” he said shortly. “Get out!” 

Deleon advanced a pace. Softly he stepped, and des¬ 
perately. “I tell you I’ve got to have it, Spencer!” he 
said dangerously. “No other way this time, Spencer. 
I’ve got to have it! I’m not talking lightly.” His tone 
became wheedling again. “0, be a good fellow, old 
Spencer!” 

Laurence pointed to his bureau. “I’ve got twenty dol¬ 
lars or so in there, Deleon. If you’re brave enough to 
stick me up for that, just you try!” 

“I’m not trying to hold you up, Spencer.” 

“I know that well. Your greasy friend Lopez tried it 



262 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


once. He learned his lesson! You think because this arm 
is bad—” Laurence stretched out his stiff left arm—“I 
don’t know how to fight. I killed the man who broke that 
arm, Deleon! I killed him with my hands!” 

Gay Deleon made a desperate leap towards the bureau 
drawer. Laurence fell on him, hurling Deleon over the 
room and bang into the wall. 

“Look, Deleon!” he said to the cowering gambler. In 
the opened drawer lay a service pistol, heavy, dull, and 
blue. “I’m a peaceable man, but I’ve seen war! Four 
notches on that gun. Count ’em!” 

Deleon backed away, not liking to see that thing of steel. 
Laurence closed the drawer. 

“I’ve seen war, I say, Deleon! I’d not stop one second 
if it were my life against another’s. Don’t forget that, 
Deleon! I’d kill a man without compunction, if I had 
to, Deleon! Bah! I don’t need a gun. My fist is enough 
for such a poor thing as you. Get going!” 

“You dirty miser!” spat Deleon, feeling safe from the 
gun. 

Laurence swung back his fist. Immediately he was 
shamed. He would as soon have struck a toad. Deleon 
saw he was safe from a blow, too. 

“You penny-pincher!” he snarled, backing out the door. 
“I hate you!” 

“Hate away,” said Laurence, slamming the door in 
Deleon’s face. 

In the hallway two men laid hands on Deleon. He looked 
to right and left, shivering. The hallway lights were 
gloomy. Deleon sobbed. 

“We’re looking for you, Mr. Deleon—” “Under war¬ 
rant sworn by Colonel Dawn!” 

“What’s this? What’s this?” screamed Deleon, as 
Spike and Stubb snapped gyves upon his wrists. 

0 bitter iron! He raised his wrists and bit it. 

“You are arrested, Deleon—” “For the murder of 
Tim Grady!” 


MESSENGER OF THE BLACK KING 


263 


LIV. MESSENGER OF THE BLACK KING! 

B ESIDE black Tom’s squatting haunches the cabbage 
palms stir gently. 0, dreadfully they move! The 
wind is sick. Thinly rustle the wings of death. 
Thinly stir the cabbage palms. 

The negro casts his white glance downward. Dreadful 
those rolling eyes! In the trembling hearing of him, the 
black king, sounds a rustling rattle. Clear, dusty dry, 
staccato: “Beware! Beware! I am the messenger of 
the Black King!” 

Two ruby eyes staring from a swaying head. Lipping 
tongue. Waving coils. Jaws yawning wide and foamy. 
Golden red those eyes, clear as ruddy wine, hard as red 
granite stone, .lovely in their burning steadfastness as the 
dear eyes of Lilith. 0, venomous breath! 0, hooked 

fangs! 0, creeping messenger from a greater King than 
black Tom Jefferson! 

“ Beware! I am the messenger of the Black King!” 
Tom hurls his great bulk through the air, tearing at the 
winds. Sharp beneath him strikes that poisoned head, 
hard as a hurled dart. Wrathfully rattles quiver. An 
insatiable mouth gapes up at him. All the sopping grasses 
are beset with eyes. The winding vines are serpents. 

Panting, choking with jungle fear, clashing his canine 
teeth, Tom swings aloft, apewise, branch to branch. He 
dares not touch that sinking mire again. From vine to 
vine, clear above the bubbling scum and the sharp spears 
of grass. Quagmires suck, thirsty for him. Birds scream. 
The air is poisonously still. 

On the stone road men go up and down. Their hard 
eyes seek the wilderness beside the road. Tom does not 
fear them now, does not fear an airplane roaring up to¬ 
wards him from the ocean. Does not fear the dogs. 

At the edge of the swamp he crouches. He draws a 
canopy of bladed grass about him, and lies flat to earth. 


26 * ONCE IN A RED MOON 

Men pass not ten yards away. Patiently he waits for 
night. 

“Beware! Beware! 1 am messenger of the Black 
King!” 

Sounds again that rattle behind him. 


LV. SHADOWS OP THE ROPE 

W IGLEY ARSEN, hearing in Jacksonville of 
Deleon’s arrest, stopped off to wire the Morning 
Mist. “The Mist’s special correspondent,” he 
telegraphically lied, “interviewed Deleon in his cell. He 
was hard, unrepentant, and defiant; and his eyes glittered 
as he talked. He was supplicating, whining, and craven; 
his eyes wavered as he protested his innocence. He was 
silent, refusing to answer all questions. He was terror- 
struck, and as he paced up and down his narrow cell his 
eyes fell to the floor, where he left them.” 

Already in a million homes and twice as many ash-cans 
reposed copies of the Morning Mist with scareheads spit¬ 
ting the name of Gay Deleon in loathsome letters. They 
declared he lay chained to the floor of his cell with anchor 
cable, while a company of militia guarded him, and a 
horde of ten thousand Southerners, bent on lynching some 
one, howled about the jail. 

Black, grotesque drawings, done by thirty dollar artists 
m back-rooms of New York, showed him writhing in his 
chains. Showed rats and cockroaches nibbling his crusts 
of bread. Showed a gibbet being erected out his cell win¬ 
dow, blotting out the lean sunlight, decked with swaying 
chains. 

The editors of the Mist, hating Deleon for reasons of their 
own, filled two extras with Arsen’s dispatch, leaving 
enough for the Sunday supplement. Reporters rushed to 
all the best New York clubs, ascertaining just when Deleon 
had been kicked out of them, and who had done the kick- 


SHADOWS OF THE HOPE 


265 


ing, and why while it was being done he hadn’t been kicked 
farther. Boosten Claude’s endeavor to shoot him was men¬ 
tioned. His relations with Pete Lopez were brought to 
new light. Rumors began to come in, from the West, of 
a Dusty Hoag, of a Weinvoll. Women’s names were linked 
with Deleon’s—names of the Arty Girl, of Rose Dawn, 
Maveen Grady, of the girl found drowned in East River. 

The Mist branded him Don Juan, and cartooned him 
wearing silk hat and spats. Even in prison, with rats 
running over his face, faithful to the silk hat. In the 
Sunday supplement, printed on Wednesday, he was 
sketched as a fat spider with striped abdomen and eight 
fuzzy legs, each spatted spider leg wound round a writh¬ 
ing young woman. 

Thus roared to the world history of Gay Deleon, or as 
much of it as was unearthed. Of Gay Deleon, gambler 
and sharp at cards, thief of honor, betrayer of women, 
fortune-hunter, blackmailer. Of Gay Deleon, accused of 
murdering old Tim Grady, and doomed full soon to hang. 

Though Deleon was a black bleating sheep, the world 
did not turn against him. The world prefers black sheep 
to milk-goats. And when a man is about to hang every 
one feels sorry for him. Hanging is so abrupt. 

Many a maidenly pillow sopped up tears poured for Gay 
Deleon. Many a flapper, flapping in the dance, stood still 
and forgot to wiggle. Many a cigaret tasted ashen and 
bitter; many a kiss full lemonish. Many dressing mirrors 
held pictures of him, debonair, confident, and sleek as a 
cat. The students of Miss Prixie’s Select School for Young 
Females, in Boston, initiated a fund to free Gay Deleon 
from those immoral Southern laws. Was the Civil War 
fought in vain, that men should be hanged in the South? 
The attendants of Dr. Mincer’s Conservatory of Ladylike 
Arts, in Washington, refused in a body to study any more 
or attend any more classes until Gay Deleon should be 

freed. 

Gay Deleon—gay Gay Deleon—doomed to die! 


266 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Thus the Morning Mist after Deleon’s arrest. But when 
Arsen and Ike arrived in Biscayne, this telegram was 
waiting: ‘‘Deleon innocent hereafter.” 

The Morning Mist had been overset in the night. It wept 
great salty tears for Deleon. It wrung its hands and 
whooped and sobbed for Deleon. It called up the Constitu¬ 
tion, Magna Charta, and Washington’s Farewell Address 
in defense of Deleon. It stated ringingly that if Deleon 
should die, then four million New York Democrats would 
know the reason why. 

This volte-face ensued after the secretary of a certain 
man (whose name is great in the nation) had cursed out 
managing editor MacErcher as heavily as a telephone may 
curse. MacErcher cursed Bill, the city editor. And Bill 
cursed Dubby, the cub. And Dubby kicked the pimpled, 
inky office-boy, silently, but with great skill. The office- 
boy strangled the office cat. So it’s an ill wind that blows 
nobody any good. 

All this may have been because Wiggs had been retained 
to defend Deleon, and Wiggs was a terror at libel suits. 
But quite likely it was because the Arty Girl’s father 
(whose name is very great in the nation) owned the Mist . 

Wigley Arsen and Ike Duval went at once to see Colo¬ 
nel Dawn on arriving in Biscayne. Old Dawn gave Ar¬ 
sen more respect than Ike, since ike was only Justice, while 
Arsen was Fame. 

“I’ve never been interviewed before,” he said. “Like 
the first time you’re married, or the first time you’re 
buried, it seems more important than it is.” 

In the jail below lay Gay Deleon. Past the windows, 
in Confederate Park a band was playing “Dixie.” All 
the winter tourists from the North violently cheered. A 
marble General Pickens rode furiously on a fat truck 
horse. A bronze Seminole Indian smoked a cigar. 

Ike Duval looked at old Dawn suspiciously, being sus¬ 
picious of all men. The Colonel grew uneasy beneath that 
solemn stone glance, thinking of his sins. An illegal bottle 


SHADOWS OF THE ROPE 


267 


in his office desk weighed on him. He remembered once 
having accepted a box of grape-fruit from Boosten Claude 
for refusing to arrest Claude after that small, irate man 
had tried to shoot up Biscayne. “OB Boosten didn’t mean 
to hurt anything,” Dawn had explained it to his conscience. 
“What if he did break a couple of plate glass windows 
and pot the garbage man? He paid for them.” And 
Dawn thought back to other sins, far back as fifty years 
before, when he had crept forth in the dark of the moon 
to rob farmers of green pineapples and sour melons. He 
wondered if Ike Duval’s glance meant he knew of that. 
Old Dawn thought of his life as a shameful thing, abhor¬ 
rent, spotted with hidden sins. He wondered if he should 
not have been himself behind the bars long ere this; if in 
him the gallows had not been cheated of a legitimate 
burden. 

Suspiciously Ike scowled; heavily spoke. “Where do I 
spit?” he demanded, shifting his tobacco. “Located the 
nigger yet, Colonel? Used to know him myself. He’s a 
bad egg.” 

“Tom’s run for the swamps,” said old Colonel Dawn. 
“Unless some of the swamp niggers help him out, he’s a 
goner. No white man knows those trails. Why, eighty 
years ago in the Seminole War whole troops of soldiers 
were sucked down together, sometimes not one man getting 
clear. The dirty Creeks’d sneak along and scalp ’em be¬ 
fore their heads oozed under.” 

“A nice country!” muttered Wigley Arsen. 

“In the swamps a man’s got to look mighty alive,” 
said old Dawn quietly. “And after a week he’s apt to 
look mighty dead.” 

“He ought to give himself up,” said Arsen. “He didn’t 
kill Tim Grady.” 

“Give himself up after his attack on Mrs. Grady? 
Would you do it? No, Sir! He’d only hang'for Grady, 
but for Rose Dawn he would burn! Not that I’m blam¬ 
ing the nigger. Any man would have wanted to put his 


268 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


hands on Rose Dawn if he were around her very long. 
And if Tom had been white, no one would have much 
minded. Can the God blame him who made men like that 
about women ? Well, when Tom is caught all I can do is 
give him white man’s justice.” 

“What sort is that?” asked Arsen curiously. 

In Confederate Park the band had struck up “Cannibal 
Isle.” Arsen looked out the window, vaguely stirred by 
the music and the heat of afternoon. Among listeners 
slowly strolling through the park, Arsen saw Rose Dawn. 
Between sleek trunks of royal palms he watched her golden 
curls. For a moment he kept still, thinking of her and the 
music. 

Padriac Grady, Boosten Claude, and Higgleson Todd 
fluttered thick about her. Hats off, they bent to whisper. 
Behind them stood van Chuch, sullenly expectant. Now 
she passed from sight. The music closed. Arsen could 
have cursed the great palms which hid her from him, 
though they were loveliest of all breathing creations, and 
the woman but the shadow of a day. 

Old Dawn looked at Arsen with wise penetration. “You 
look ill, Mr. Arsen,” he said. “Or perhaps you are in 
love ?’ ’ 

“No! 0, no! No, indeed; not hardly!” Arsen denied, 
waving away the horrible thought. “In love with the 
tropics,” he added lamely, flushing red. 

“I know that sort of love, too,” said Dawn. “But it 
bears a woman’s name.” 

Rose Dawn had come again into view, just for a mo¬ 
ment, with sunlight through gold-flecked shadows strew¬ 
ing her face. Old Dawn stared with hoary wisdom at 
Arsen, shaking his head. His voice was muffled. 

A beautiful woman,’ he whispered. “Like the tropics. 
They get hold of a man. Here!” He extracted the il¬ 
legal bottle from his desk. “Have a drink!” 

And out here in Confederate Park stroll various people. 

\an Chuch, Rose Dawn, Tim Grady’s son are here; and 


SHADOWS OF THE ROPE 


269 


Higgleson Todd; and Boosten Claude, the gun-toter; and 
Schermerhorn; and the son of old Thorn Clay. It may be 
one of them, it may be more, struck the stroke to old Tim 
Grady. 

Down on them blazes the tropic sun, God’s awful eye. 
Yet not one soul starts, turns white, gasps, utters a low 
moan, drops his eyebrows, quivers like a leaf, sobs con¬ 
tritely, or otherwise gives sign of guilt. None even clasps 
his hands supplicatingly to Heaven. What has come over 
the world ? Murderers used to do it. 

In spite of God’s awful eye their little gestures are calm. 
Van Chuch and Boosten Claude, struggling to walk at Rose 
Dawn’s side, kick each other’s shins. “I beg your par¬ 
don,” says van Chuch, not begging anything.— 4 ‘Excuse 
me,” says Claude, nudging van Chuch violently. They 
look unwholesomely at each other. Boosten Claude has his 
hands on his hip pockets. Van Chuch grits his sturdy 
jaws; his fists clasp and open. 

“You are an impertinent beggar, Claude!” says van 
Chuch hoarsely. 

“Say that again!” booms Claude, his voice larger than 
himself. His hands move towards his bulging hips, threat¬ 
ening murder. “ Say that again ! ” 

Van Chuch says it again. Nothing happens. 

A small gallery, led by Mrs. Weinvoll, follows the famous 
people about the park sward. Rose Dawn, loveliest of 
women, is still a marvel to Biscayne. “Just the way she 
looks! ’ ’ run whispers. ‘ ‘ She looks like herself ! Who 
would think it? Natural as in ‘Sin!’ ” 

God’s aw 7 ful eye! No murderer screams, none froths, 
none falls to ground. 

Mrs. Mallow comes pouting and prancing over the grass, 
endeavoring to snare Thornwood Clay from Rose’s side. 
Clay looks at her in weariness; no weariness in earth or 
Orcus greater than that for an unloved, outloved woman. 
Mrs. Mallow’s small eyes sparkle. No blush is on her 
painted cheeks. She waves her hands in all her pretty 


270 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


gestures. The Queen of Spades! She steps on a toad and 
squeals, overcome with that horror of creeping things which 
is instinctive in all female women. No man offers to help 
her or the toad. 

Mrs. Mallow prances up to Todd. “0 you dreadful, 
dreadful, Mr. Todd! Who is that little blond girl who 
goes around with you so much?” 

Todd mutters, casting his eyes apprehensively around for 
Mary Dubby. He is finding Miss Dubby is not so easily 
subjected as she was in his legal offices. That may be— 
not to crack the wind of the poor phrase, running it thus 
—because his offices to her are not legal. 

Old Colonel Dawn, Ike Duval, and Wigley Arsen drank 
from the illegal bottle. Night dropped on Confederate 
Park. God’s awful eye had blinked. The golden curls of 
Rose Dawn were hidden. The music was stilled. 

A grinning black man knocked and entered. “Lady to 
see you-all, Gunnel.” He bowed, did a shuffle and scrape, 
and jig-stepped sideways. 

“Who is it, Twombly?” asked old Dawn, quickly hiding 
the bottle. 

“Ptolemy?” repeated Arsen, misunderstanding. 
Twombly, I said. Tell the gentleman your name, 
Twombly. ’ ’ 

The negro scuffled, snapping his fingers happily. 
“Twombly Carruthers Fitzmaurice Black!” he sang. His 
grinning mouth touched his ears. 

“All those names to distinguish him from the other ten 
million blacks?” asked Arsen, lifting his brows. “I sup¬ 
pose his father gave him the last name, while his fond 
mother gave him all the rest.” 

“No, Sir,” said old Down, shifting his feet. “His 

mother gave him the last name, but the others were his 
father’s.” 

Twombly danced out the door, admitting Mrs. Mallow. 
That lady was in a boiling fury. She had forgotten her 


SHADOWS OF THE ROPE 


271 


pouting graces; her hat was askew. Musically after her 
skated Twombly Carruthers Fitzmaurice Black, cracking 
his fingers, twisting his body from the hips. Mrs. Mallow 
jounced him with her elbow. On skittering heels he top¬ 
pled, flopping against a desk. He continued his jazz 
melody with fingers beating the wood. 

Mrs. Mallow sputtered like a short circuit; she fizzed like 
a fuse. “I want you to arrest Thornwood Clay, Colonel!” 
she shouted. She stamped her foot. Her glittering eyes 
were small as shiny dimes. 

Gravely old Dawn looked at her. “Anything else, 
ma’m ? ’ ’ 

“Ask him where he was the night Tim Grady was mur¬ 
dered ! ’ ’ she shouted. 

If Mallow’s face had ever been lovely, such beauty was 
departed. The lamented Messers Marsh and Mallow must 
have stirred on their earthly pillows, wondering why they 
ever so joyously ate her arsenic and oysters. Ah, beauty, 
where is thy sting? 

‘ ‘ Clay ’ll toss me down for that Grady girl, will he ? ” she 
cried. “He thinks he can kick me off! Ask him where 
he was!” 

“Where was he, ma’m?” 

“McGinty drove him and me to Daytona!” she shouted, 
hauling at her hat. “I want Thorn Clay arrested for ab¬ 
duction ! ’ ’ 

Old Colonel Dawn thought gravely. “A boat leaves 
for Havana at six tomorrow morning,” he said, interlock¬ 
ing his knuckles. “You’ll take it!” 

Mrs. Mallow gasped. “Trying to frame me?” she 
panted. “Frame me because I’m not so young as I was? 
Why don’t you frame another woman I might name? 
Afraid of her yellow curls, are you ? Afraid of Rose Dawn 
Grady’s pretty eyes? Wait ten years, and you won’t be so 
easy on her, Colonel Stoughton Dawn!” She wagged her 
finger violently. “I stood trial for Marsh and Mallow— 


272 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


make her stand trial for Tim Grady! The whole world 
knows she hired Gay Deleon to kill him! The whole 
world —’ 1 

“Six o’clock/’ said Dawn, growing white. His black 
brows were one line above his burning eyes. “Don’t let 
me see you after that!” 

“Do your duty and arrest Rose Dawn! I’ll tell the 
world—” 

But Mrs. Mallow did not stay. She saw a glance in 
old Dawn’s eyes she was dreadfully afraid to brave. 
Wilted of plume, she went out the door. 

Though forelooking is as unproductive in historians as 
in Sieur Nuits, still we’ll say that Mrs. Mallow took the 
boat. She packed her perfumes, her. corsets, rouge-pots, 
flapper frocks, hair, and teeth, and went in the small dawn. 
Maybe she still flourishes in Havana. ’Tis said that there 
they like ’em fat. 

Suddenly men were shouting out the window, down be¬ 
low. Towards the jail they were running. Far away on 
the town streets, rushing through the park, swelling by the 
river, rose a jubilant cry. Something crashed to earth be¬ 
neath the window. Men panted. Blows rained. A 
ghastly voice groaned: “0, white gen’men!” 

“They’ve caught Tom Jefferson!” said Arsen in solemn 
tones. 

A pack of men were writhing down on the ground, in 
the blackness, in the shadows of bushes, beneath the win¬ 
dow of the cell of Gay Deleon. More runners panted up, 
their breathing harsh as dogs. 

“What’s the matter down there?” old Dawn roared, 
leaning far out the window. “You, Boosten Claude, what 
are you doing to my boy ? ’ ’ 

“Your boy, Colonel?” muttered Claude. “Well, that’s 
right!” 

A roar of good-natured laughter swelled from the crowd. 
“It’s only the Colonel’s Twombly!”—“It’s not Tom. 
Poor old Twombly!”—“Good boy, Twombly!”—“He ain’t 


SHADOWS OF THE ROPE 


273 


done nothing. Let him go.’’—“ ’S long ’s we got him, 
might as well have a little fun.”—“Let’s pertend to string 
him up for fun.”—“All niggers look alike to me.”— 
“Rope! Rope! Rope!”— 

Old Dawn leaned forth, his fierce eyes fixing individuals 
of the mob. Each man who saw that glance upon him 
tried to hide behind his fellows. 

“Who touches that boy will die!” roared old Colonel 
Dawn. “I keep the law in Biscayne ! You touch him, and 
you’ll die!” 

With his glances on the ground Boosten Claude walked 
away. The others followed him, hurrying furtively. 
Twombly was still whimpering. White men’s mobs are 
bad medicine for black boys, even when the white men 
laugh. 

Old Dawn still pounded the window-ledge, breathing 
deeply. 

“Great Greece, Colonel,” Arsen mumbled. 

“What is it, Sir!” 

“You look just like Anthony when he is fierce and 
angry.” 


LYI. DEATH TO THE DOG! 

B LACK TOM has broken free! He has slipped 
through the cordons of the posses. Northward he 
pants and stumbles. The hounds howl after him. 
O, the love of women, Tom Jefferson! 0, the blood of 
men! 

Crawling along by starlight, cowering in brush and 
thicket by day, eaten by ravenous mosquitoes and scorching 
suns, seeing the hard-eyed men pass up and down un¬ 
endingly with guns upon their hips. Their mouths are 
thin. Dogs yap. Telephones and church bells ring over 
the countryside. 

Behind him the grewsome swamps, the cold reptilians. 


271 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


His feet clog in sand, tangle in bristly undergrowth, stum¬ 
ble over coral crooked as lava, sludge through tomato 
fields and citrus orchards. Up about him like danger fires 
lift the smoke of habitations. 

All day he has lain in an irrigation ditch which cuts 
through grape-fruit orchards. Golden globes of fruit hang 
in green bowers, ripened for picking. Dawn, towering 
swift and yellow, found him here. He waits the cloudy 
night. 

Two men have been moving about the orchards since 
morning. Their voices are gruff. They stir as slowly as 
fish in water. All the world seems a dream. 

One stands near the ditch, looking down at the brown 
waters. Hidden under overlapping grasses beneath the 
hollow of the bank, Tom is not two feet away. Earth 
clods shake on him at the men’s tread. The man casts a 
pebble. Ripples lap Tom’s nose. 

“When do you reckon they’ll catch the nigger?” 

“Before night.” 

Boosten Claude, owner of the orchards, walks out. At 
his heels scampers a little white wooly dog. “Shut up, 
Mutt!” Claude’s lips are hard, his eyes red. He has 
been up all night. A pistol hangs at either overalled hip. 

“Any news of the nigger, Mr. Claude?” 

“He’s left the swamps. We’ll get him before night.” 

“When you do, I’m laying off work, Mr. Claude.” 

Their voices to black Tom are faint as bells. Over the 
hills a bell is ringing. Haze lies on the swimming yellow 
day. Creation sleeps. 

The white wooly dog is short-legged, shrill, weak, in¬ 
quisitive, an imp of canine beasts. No dog for a man. 

Lie down, Mutt! Look pretty. Get out of my feet, 
you whelp! ’ ’ 

Mutt looks toward the ditch with yiping blasphemy. 
He scampers up, stretches out his paws, and yips. Howl- 
1^® turns and flees back to his master. Plis white wool 
bristles; his soft ears flop; his little pink eyes spit fire. 


DEATH TO THE DOG 


275 


Thickly as the mud he lies in the heart of black Tom 
oozes. With all black oaths, senseless grummerings older 
than speech, Tom curses the little cur. Curses him by the 
gods of fire and death and poison, by the alligator and 
the snake, by the jungle and the fen. Damns his sire 
which was a rabbit, his dam which was a skunk. Damns 
his offspring, which will be weasels. Damns him wool and 
hide and hair and bark and snarl. Damns the fleas upon 
his back. 

Boosten Claude wanders nearer to the ditch. Mutt darts 
out from between his legs, frothy with snarls, and whines 
back again. 

“Shut up, Mutt!” Claude peers up at a tree. “Boys, 
it looks like scale’s been on this tree.” 

He climbs, pushing aside prickly branches, shielding his 
face with his arms. He disappears in the dark green 
leaves. Once more Mutt trots warily toward the ditch, 
growling sharply. He prances and frisks, wiping fore¬ 
paws on the grass. For his bulk, Mutt s voice is louder 
than a lion’s. He growls with ominous teeth. He frisks 
in the grasses by the ditch’s bank. He dares to nip at 
Tom’s wretched face. Growing brave, he snaps at his 
eyes. 

“Take a look at Mutt, boys!” Claude cries from the tree. 
“Reckon he’s spotted a snake, the little devil!” Claude 
begins to descend, feeling his way cautiously. Sic em, 

Mutt! Go after ’em, boy! ” 

Out of the weedy waters snaps up a giant black hand, 
huge as the little cur. It strangles that yelping pipe, clots 
the breath within that throat. Mutt’s feeble body, thin 
as a sparrow beneath the fluffy coat, writhes in death con¬ 
vulsions. Legs claw vainly. Eyes pop out. No whine. 

Clawing legs dangle limply. Eyes, grotesquely goggled, 
bloody with veins, are veiled with mortal film. Tom shakes 
that rag. He flings it in the ditch. Up, and running! 
Staggering between the trees of golden fruit! Away! 

“Mutt!” thunders Boosten Claude. His tone is a 


276 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


scream. 1 ‘ Look, look, look! There he is! On him, boys! 
Don’t let him get away!” 

Tom has leaped a low stone wall. He stumbles through 
grasses. He stretches out his arms towards the swamps. 
Voices beat. Shots follow him. 

LVII. THE ROLLING DICE 

F OR the first time since Florida arose from the coral 
sea, the Biscayne jail housed a white man neither 
Republican nor drunk. Spike and Stubb kept 
guard before the hot iron doors. Curious men, having 
nothing better to do, paused to stare simmeringly, their 
tongues lolling. Threat of lynching still ran in the air. 
Men’s whispers Tvere not pleasant. 

A small boy was perched in a tall palm by the jail. 
He had not come down for breakfast, and seemed in no 
hurry to come down for dinner. “Climb down—” “Out 
o’ that!” the officers ordered him valiantly. Their an¬ 
swer was a jeer. Only a monkey could have climbed that 
palm. Stubb tried it, but his fat legs slipped on the un¬ 
wrinkled bark, and he slid down on his hind end in the 
midst of a nest of ants. 

Spike picked up a grapefruit from the gutter. Old 
brown it was, and rotten ripe, and crammed with sizzling 
juice. His stiff hair bristling with anger, Spike hurled 
it at the imp in the tree. The dauntless eanling dodged, 
caught the missile at the top of its parabola, and threat¬ 
ened to hurl it back again. The officers retreated inside 
the jail. 

All the youngster could see was a blank brick jail wall, 
unutterably red and hot. But he continued to gawp as 
though it might unroll. His mouth was parted,° wet at 
the corners with saliva. An ant crawled down his neck. 
Anon below passed one of his compeers, bare-footed, star- 
ing-eyed, gat-toothed, and freckled. Thereupon the imp 
in the tree gibbered and swayed and shrilled. Made faces 


THE ROLLING DICE 


277 


Shook the palm fronds and yawhawed, giving expression 
to spiritual exaltation with thumb at nose. His friends 
stared up wistfully, as at a divinity. The imp grinned 
and tried to wiggle his ears. 

Spike and Stubb paced slowly back and forth past Del¬ 
eon’s cell. Their faces were watchful and doomed. Del¬ 
eon did not look up at them. 

He sat humped on his steel cot. Not at the barred blue 
window did he stare, but at the gray floor. His hair was 
no more sleek as a wet cat’s, but fallen in long touseled 
strands about his forehead. One of his mustaches yet 
pointed upward with the old time arrogance, the other 
drooped unkempt down. To the tall gallows one pointed, 
to the pits of Sheol the other. A scum of black beard gave 
his sleek cheeks the look of piracy, made him look tough 
as old leather. 

Truly not the same Gay Deleon who snared women’s 
hearts. His linen was soiled and wilted. His white buck 
shoes were smudged. His pants—what word can express 
it ?—his pants were uncreased. He was true prototype of 
those hardened, unconfessing, unrepenting baby-stranglers 
whom old ladies love to visit in prison, feeding them 
chocolate drops and Bible tracts. 

Twice night and a day had passed him by in jail. “0 
God!” at first he had screamed; but his throat grew harsh. 
He had wept; but his tears ran dry. He howled; but 
breath failed him at the last, and he could only hoarsely 
croak. 

Fallen to silent despair, a brooding stupor. He stared 
at the cement floor. Once he had knotted his cravat in a 
silly noose, and swung it to a window bar. But he saw 
Gay Deleon hanging there, and in frenzy he tore the cravat 
apart. When food was brought he contemplated the 
knife. How easily, with what little pain—0 pain,, more 
horrible even than death to Deleon!—might he drain out 
blood from his wrists, play the high-born Roman, lie down 

to fading sleep. 


278 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Gay Deleon was no Roman. No courage he knew to end 
his stinking life. Death might be best. He pondered on 
it; he dared to ponder. But self-appointed, by his own 
hand released, he dared not face the howling night. 

To you, Deleon, as you visited mercy, mercy shall be 
visited again. Now, in your black hour, think of them 
on whom the black hour has fallen. Of old Thorn Clay, 

and many another ruined gambler. Of Dot, and your 
women. 

Deleon had known such despair before, had known all 
dire horrors of the losing gambler. Yet but a turn of one 
rolling die, and he would be Deleon again. The hills would 
not be high enough for him. But a turn of the dice— 

He could hear Spike and Stubb down the corridor roll- 
ing out dice on a hard floor. Rattle and click! Grumbling 
oaths. Deleon raised his ears and listened. 

And now back and forth in front of him the policemen 
tiptoed, fixing him with stern glances. Their loud voices 
died. They were portentous with silences. So went the 
hours. Deleon was consumed with remembrances. 

Curiously, it was young Spencer whom he hated, per¬ 
haps because Spencer’s had been the last face he saw 
while free. A man must make his devils visible, must have 
one soul on whom he fastens the supremacy of his odious 
passion. “I’ll get him! I’ll pay him back!” Deleon 
raved. He raved. He was not in position to get anything, 
save to get it in the neck. 

The officers were staring grewsomely in at him. Their 
hands clasped those bars which might not be shaken. They 
stared as two ruffled owls into the den of a rattlesnake. 
They spoke as to a thing which stank. 

“Mrs. Grady has got permission—” “From Colonel 
Dawn to see you, Deleon.” 

Deleon started up from his squeaky cot, striving to 
slick back his hair. He shook his clothing, rubbed his 
chin biistles, e\en in his despair endeavoring to look again 
the gallant cavalier. He mumbled a sickly “Hello!” to 


THE ROLLING DICE 


279 


Rose Dawn, who stood white and still before his barred 
door. 

The watching officers drew away. Deleon grasped his 
bars and strove to smile, looking much like a monkey. 
Rose stood on uneven hips, one hand at her breast. Del¬ 
eon’s loss of morale was terrific. She did not smile back. 

Deleon moistened his lips. ‘‘Good of you to come, 
Rose,” he said, his tongue thick. “You always were ten¬ 
der-hearted. You’d not forget.” 

Rose paused. She could not look at him. “Padriac has 
telegraphed Mr. Wiggs to defend you, when—when—” 
Still she could not look at him. 

Deleon was visibly heartened. “That’s fine of young 
Grady ! ’ ’ Dow r n the corridor again he heard sound of roll¬ 
ing dice. Life was not so bad. Always a chance. “Very 
fine of young Grady!” he said again. 

He picked up his cravat and put it on. Shook wrinkles 
from his coat. Again brushed his hair. “Why not have 
him see about bond for me?” he whined. “If Grady 
wouldn’t do it, Schermerhorn might. He always was a 
fool.” 

Rose was constrained. ‘ ‘ I didn’t know bond was taken— 
for this.” 

“But I’m not guilty, Rose! I didn’t do it!” 

Rose cast an uneasy glance about. No one was within 
hearing. Spike and Stubb were crouching in the entrance, 
their dicer’s oaths heavy. “Didn’t you, Gay?” she whis¬ 
pered in trembling voice. She stared at him from the blue 
silences of her eyes. 

Deleon shook his bars. “Rose! Rose Dawn! You 
don’t believe that! What do you mean, Rose?” He 
struck his fist against the bars, wincing for pain. “It’s a 
frame-up!” he shouted. “Somebody put this thing on 

me!” 

Rose did not answer. Deleon fell back from the bars, 
dropping down on his cot. He shook with harsh sobs. lie 
covered his face. He beat the stone floor with his heels. 


280 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Rose watched him with that same cold bright glance. A 
cold glance, or hot. Something in her eyes of sultry 
ocean heat. 

“I’m sorry, Gay,” Rose whispered compassionately, 
when the silence had endured long. 

Deleon brought his hands down from his face. He be¬ 
gan to weave his knuckles. His thoughts must have been 
very bitter. He rubbed his face, and groaned. With fierce 
gesture he tore off that strangling cravat. 

“Sorry!” he jeered thickly. “You—you got me in this 
yourself! You know who killed old Tim Grady! 0 God! 
Thank God I never fell for you!” 

Rose Dawn drew back, clear across the width of the cor¬ 
ridor. 

“Wait! Wait, Rose Dawn! You shan’t go till I’ve 
damned you more than John Dawn did when he went off 
to war.” 

A whisper. “What do you know about that?” 

What do I know ? Ha! He wrote you he was sick of 
you and wanted to go away! I know! Told you to come 
to me! Ha, ha, ha, ha!” Deleon gasped with terrible 
laughter. “What are you crying for? I know, I know! 
ITow ? Ha, ha, ha! Why, damn your blue eyes! How do 
I know? 1 dictated that letter myself, and John Dawn’s 
name was signed by Pete Lopez!” 

“What?” 

Wait! Wait! You ’ll put something over on me ? I ’ll 
put something over on you! We were drunk one night, 
Pete and I, and I swore I could get you. Sent that letter 
to you—sent one to John Dawn, telling him to get the Hell 
out, and Pete signed your name to it! Ha, ha, ha!” 
Again the strangling mirth. “We knew you’d had a 
lovers ’ quarrel,^ and Dawn was always a hot fool. Damn 
it, Rose! You’ll put something over on me, Rose! Re¬ 
member I sent John Dawn to where he won’t come back. 

I’ve won from you, Rose Dawn, whatever stakes you play 
for!” 


THE ROLLING DICE 


281 


‘ ‘You’re crazy mad,” Rose whispered. 

“It was a joke! But I’d not marry you—you hadn’t 
any money. I could have had you, Rose Dawn! But I 
didn’t want you. I don’t want you. I don’t want you! 
1 don’t want you! You— You— Ah, God! Ha, ha, 
ha! One trick! Llot-headed old John Dawn! I’ll slap 
his face in Hell. Get away! Get away! There ’re a 
thousand women like you. Do I care for your damned 
tears ? I have been drowned in tears! I ’ll shout it to 
the world who killed old Tim Grady! ’ ’ 

Long after Rose had gone Deleon continued his mad 
shouting, pacing up and down his narrow cell with panther 
quickness. 

Out by the door hushed oaths. “A natural, bones! 
Little seven out of Heaven! 0, the ladies love you, Rich¬ 

ard ! Shoot the works, Spike ! ’ ’ 

The rolling dice! Deleon harkened. Fate must not be 
despaired of. A lucky toss, and these bars would be 
opened. He would have money in his pockets. The world 
was his. There were other lovely women than Rose Dawn. 
O, money and women! 0, the jaunty heart! 0, the roll¬ 
ing dice! 

That night Gay Deleon vanished out of jail. Out of the 
bars ineluctable, out of the steel doors. Spike and Stubb 
stood stalwartly to swear he had gone as goes blowing 
smoke. But the thing is, he was gone. 


LVIII. HOWLING GHOSTS 

A RETHUSA WEINYOLL and Mary Dubby sat on 
the Poinsettia’s veranda late that night. This 
was the night men hunted for Gay Deleon. 

The girls’ arms circled each other’s shoulders. Are- 
thusa, who was no dunce, suspected Miss Dubby of being 
a very good stenographer, suspected her, in fact, of being 
everything she might be suspected of being. But Arethusa 


282 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


was daughter of this up and jumping generation, and 
didn’t believe in respectability. 

Arethusa boasted of her immoralities as proudly as a 
little boy boasting the cats he’s killed. With many night- 
hid blushes she whispered the name of Gay Deleon. Mary 
Dubby, however, was very respectable. 

Arethusa grew hysterical as she reflected on Gay’s fate, 
not knowing that prisoning doors had opened up and freed 
him. There was her knight, for all she knew, incarcerated 
in unknightly donjon keep and fortress vile, to wit, the vil¬ 
lage hoosegow. And, from all authentic gossip, in a fair 
way to hang; a most unromantic attitude to take. 

s guilty!” wept Arethusa, twisting a handkerchief. 
“He must be. He has such calloused eyes. Yet I can’t 
help thinking it was done all for me.” 

Perhaps not,” Mary conceded, feeling for a pencil in 
her hair. She smashed a mosquito on her stockings, and 
chewed a little gum, keeping her arm about Arethusa and 
gazing out at the black night. “I hope not,” said she. 

“Of course he is!” cried Arethusa, rising to Deleon’s 
defense. “0, he did it, all right. You can’t understand 
the agony, Mary. Each breath is a gnawing cry crushing 
my heart. Each drop of blood in my glands is hysterical. 
And I dare not say a thing to mamma.” 

“If he is, then she is!” said Miss Dubby hatefully. She 
did not like the way Higgleson Todd ran after Rose Dawn. 

Whatever happens to him will happen to Rose Dawn 
Grady— 0, I hope!” 

Arethusa gasped. For any other woman to hang with 
hei homicidal lover was not endurable. One woman suffer¬ 
ing for a man is tragedy, two is bigamy. Arethusa wept. 
“Why do men do such things, Marv?” 

“Deviltry is born in all of ’em,” said Mary. “If they 
don t kill some one, they beat their wives. Or give dicta¬ 
tion with their feet on the desk.” 

Arethusa dried her little freckled nose. Her milk-white 
arms gleamed in the night. She rested her chin in her 


HOWLING GHOSTS 


283 


palms. Old Colonel Dawn, leaping furiously up the ve¬ 
randa steps, eyed her keenly. 

“If he wanted me, I’d go with him to the ends of the 
earth,” said Arethusa softly. “I’d hang in his place. 
For I love him!” 

“No sense in being foolish about it,” said Miss Dubby 
practically. 

Arethusa clasped her knees. “And I know Gay loves 
me! For he told me he did. Don’t say a thing of this to 
mamma, for Heaven’s sake! She thinks he’s been going 
with Bunnie Hoag. And two days ago mamma and that 
odious old Higgs woman had a dreadful quarrel about it, 
just after Bunnie ran away.” 

“I know how to mind my own business,” said Mary. “I 
won’t say anything.” 

“It’s queer to be in love,” said Arethusa, sighing deep. 

“I don’t know,” said Mary. “I never was.” 

Higgleson Todd slipped out of the hotel and sat on the 
steps with them. He smoked cigars. He was glad of the 
darkness. In the light he did not care to be seen with Mary 
Dubby. Yet she was a pretty, frail thing. Todd glanced 
at his watch. Soon he would go to dance with Rose Dawn. 

“Where has Bunnie Hoag gone?” Mary asked after a 
pause. 

“I don’t worry about her,” said Arethusa listlessly. 
“She’s a little fool. She’s crazy about that simple-minded 
Laurence Spencer.” 

“You don’t think anything has happened to her?” 

“Goodness! I don’t know. I don’t care.” 

Old Dawn came forth again, and being blind for the 
sudden darkness, stumbled over them. “I beg your par¬ 
don, ma’m. Miss Weinvoll, isn’t it? And Mr. Todd.” 
The Colonel peered at the three of them. Todd grew vastly 
uneasy, for the old man’s black eyes were sharp. “And 
who is this young lady?” asked Dawn with an old man’s 
geniality. “I don’t remember seeing her pretty smiles 
before.” 


284 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“0, this is Mr. Todd’s—” said Arethusa. 

“My wife!” roared Higgleson Todd, quite out of bal¬ 
ance. He was thinking of a man named Mann. “This is 
my wife, Sir! ’ ’ 

“I beg your pardon, Sir!” snorted old Dawn, walking 
away, not knowing how he had offended the gentleman from 
the No’th. He turned from the darkness. “If any of 
you see Deleon,” he said, “don’t let him get away!” 

“Two,” whispered Miss Dubby cryptically, laying down 
her second finger. (“Two what?” stuttered Todd.) “0, 
just counting,” smiled Mary Dubby. 

“Glad to see you’ve got that far,” Todd grunted. 

Arethusa sat alone after Mary and Todd had left her. 
Long past midnight she sat. Light went out in her 
mother’s room. Many other lights in the hotel. At the 
Deepsea Club people were dancing. Par from the bay 
front Arethusa heard the music tinkling. A few idlers 
still walked around the verandas, strolling to the tune of 
soft whispers. And silence. 

From the darkness of vines near the veranda a low voice 
spoke to Arethusa. “Arethusa!” She startled, clapping 
hand to mouth. “Don’t say anything! Be quiet! 
They ’re looking for me!” 

She followed a beckoning hand, and crept down into the 
darkness. A car stood waiting. South it went, on the 
road past the cypress swamps. 

And that night Wigley Arsen walked down alone to the 
Thorn. He had with him the serpent knife, borrowed from 
old Colonel Dawn. A curious idea had come to Arsen of 
tracing the murderer’s emotions step by step. Of handling 
the knife with him. Of creeping down the deck with him. 
Of thrusting his arm through the little porthole with him. 
Of striking down the murderous blade with him, though 
what he struck at should be no more than bed pillows. It 
all would be good for a feature story in the Sunday sup¬ 
plement of the Mist. 


HOWLING GHOSTS 


285 


The Thorn lay untenanted, a white ghost ship in black 
waters. The river ripples rocked her. Her masts were 
tangled in the starless night. 

Red the Sailor sat by the gangplank, smoking. “I 
wouldn’t go on her nohow,” Red warned Arsen. “No, 
Sir-ee! She’s ha ’nted! ’ ’ 

Arsen tried a lofty laugh. University men do not be¬ 
lieve in ghosts. But Arsen strode up the gangplank slowly. 
His feet grew leaden. Dark was the night. He heard the 
breath of shadows. He saw great empty Nothing. 

“What do you mean, haunted?” he called to Red. 

“Ha’nted w T ith a ghostie,” said Red. “E’ry night, 
come six bells o’ the evening watch, I hear that ghostie 
screaming! A noise like this—‘ E-e-e! ’ ” Horribly Red 
the Sailor shrilled, making Arsen quiver. “When I hears 
that, I up and walks away,” said Red the Sailor, with the 
wide gaze of a little child. 

Wigley Arsen stood square in front of the little porthole 
of old Tim Grady’s cabin. Blackly that round window 
shone in the night. Arsen fingered the carven serpent of 
the heavy knife, fingered the sharp blade. It was good for 
any ghostie. It was fire unto his hands. 

Arsen was brave. All men are. “You’re a fool!” he 
called to Red the Sailor. And put his hand upon the port¬ 
hole glass! 

From that dreadful cabin rose a moaning, more dreadful 
than sound ever heard before on land or sea! A loath¬ 
some shriek! It was no wind. It was no living thing. It 
was the voice of sentient soul tossed in torments. It was 
the screaming of the damned! 

“Don’t!” shrieked Red. “0 my God, watch out for 
year soul, man living! ’ ’ 

He fled down the dock away from the ghost-white Thorn. 
He tore at air. His face was white as lightning. 

Once again from the cabin of the dead man rose that 
scream, and the soul of Wigley Arsen turned jelly in him. 


286 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“ ’Tis a bloody, bloody moon! I fear for it!” 

Arsen caught a sight of something terrible and gray be¬ 
hind that porthole. The knife slipped from his hand. He 
heard its weighted point thump in the deck. He ate his 
liver. His spine was snow. 

11 Arsen ! Arsen! ’ ’ rose that scream. 

Wigley Arsen backed away down the deck, muttering. 
“Don’t scare me! You can’t scare me! I’m an intelligent 
man. I’m not frightened at anything. I know you’re 
human. I’m not afraid. This is a hoax. I’m not 
afraid.” 

In singsong he spoke, but his voice died away. He tried 
to summon it again, for it was sweeter than the angels. 
“I’m perfectly calm, I assure you,” he silently mouthed. 
“I’m going to investigate this. I represent a great news¬ 
paper, and we’ll not be fooled. I don’t believe in ghosts. 
You can’t frighten me, I assure you.” 

The water rippled. The trees rustled. The wind 
groaned. Arsen’s feet tripped over the gangplank, and 
for the instant he thought Hell had him by the heels. 

“0 Arsen! Murdered for a woman’s love! Don’t strike 
me with that knife!” 

“Get away, Tim Grady!” Arsen screamed. “You’re 
no friend of mine!” 

He leaped over the quay as though his feet were winged. 
Beyond his shoulder he saw a thing all white fluttering on 
the Thorn. Arsen overtook the fleeing Red. He passed 
him as though Red stood still. He hardly touched the 
ground. He caught up with his own shadow and left it 
behind him. 

Wigley Arsen did not pause to breathe till he was safe 
in the Deepsea Club, and laughing crowds of dancers were 
about him. But still he heard that scream, and would hear 
it forever after— 

“Murdered for a woman’s love! Don’t strike me with 
that knife!” 


WOMEN AND WHISKY AND WRATH 287 


LIX. WOMEN AND WHISKY AND WRATH 

M ANY danced in the Deepsea Club that night, but 
Rose Dawn was not among them. Early into 
the morning the dancers scuffled, to the croaking 
of viol and the cricketing of violin. 

“I don’t know what’s possessed Rose,” said Mrs. Higgs 
to Todd. “She’s been so queer and cold of late, and she 
looks at me so funny. She snuk off some place this after¬ 
noon, and it’s my private opinion she snuk off to see 
Deleon in jail. If she did—! If she did—!” The old 
buzzard closed her jowls and wagged her head, silently 
promising tortures unheard of for her lovely daughter. 
“And since then she’s been sitting in her room looking 
like she’s dead. If she’d only squall, I’d understand it. 
You expect a lady to squall. But just sitting still, not 
talking or saying a word—it ain’t human. 7’ll make her 
come! 7’ll send for her. She’ll mind me!” 

What commands, threats, or exhortations Mrs. Higgs 
used to draw Rose to the dance are a secret with Mrs. 
Higgs. But Rose came, at a late hour. Old Colonel Dawn, 
ruthlessly carrying on the search for Deleon, looked in, 
and saw her. And stood apart, where she could not see 
him, gravely watching her. 

On piers the Deepsea Club extended over the waters of 
Bay Mimayne. Black as black jewels waves sparkled be¬ 
low, twinkling duskily between floor cracks. Rose leaned 
over the bayward railing, staring deeply down at the tides. 
She was in a gown of purple more spangled than the star¬ 
less night. Her shoulders moved. Old Dawn surmised she 
was quietly, stilly sobbing. But no sound came from her 
throat, and no tears in her eyes. What passions warred 
behind that softly stirring bosom? What thoughts tossed 
beneath her golden curls? 

Rose dreamed. Waters tossed. Music silenced. A 



288 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


motor-boat went down the bay—“Put! Put! Uf!—Put! 
Put! Put! Uf!—Put! Uf!—Put! Put! Put! Put!—” A 
rough, uneven dissonance. Old Dawn thought of a ragged 
stone’s dimensions made audible. Far out past the coral 
reefs sounded the ocean. 

Behind her stood Padriac Grady, not daring for some 
reason to approach and break into her musings. His hands 
worked. In the darkness Padriac bore some resemblance 
to old Tim Grady. Something in the gleam of his gray 
eyes; something in the thrusting forward of his neck; 
something in the untidiness of his dark red hair mirrored 
his father. 

With a start he moved toward her, cautiously, a little un¬ 
certain of himself. Rose seemed unconscious of his pres¬ 
ence. Hushed she was as the night, hushed as an immortal 
in alabaster. She was Astarte, cold as the virgin moon. 
She was Aphrodite, queen of oceans of passion. Which¬ 
ever, she was a goddess. 

“Wonderful night,” said Padriac thickly, paying no 
heed to the night. 

Rose did not hear, so deeply she looked at the black 
swimming tides. Her soft breast pressed against 
the wooden railing, and stirred, and shook. Padriac 
Grady wished to his God that he were even as that wooden 
railing. 

Mrs. Higgs marched up, waving a crimson feather fan. 
She linked arms with her daughter, giving Padriac vicious 
looks. Her brassy hair looked lemon in the dark. Above 
her low-cut gown her puffy flesh jiggled like jelly. 

“What are you after now?” she demanded of Padriac. 
“Do you think you can keep us by a grin from getting our 
rights ? ’ ’ 

1 ‘ What is the matter ? ’ ’ cried Rose, waking up. 

“I’ll say my say when I have my say to say,” declared 
Mrs. Higgs furiously. “If you had half the sense I’ve 
tried to put into you, you’d know we got to fight for our 
rights in this world. For you, Mr. Padriac Grady, I’ll 


WOMEN AND WHISKY AND WRATH 


289 


say right now we’re not going to stand for you and Bell- 
bender getting everything. We’ll fight you to the last. 
Did we throw away our youth and beauty ? Did we marry 
old Grady to get a soup bone?” 

Mrs. Higgs talked for five minutes, fanning herself pas¬ 
sionately. ‘‘ What did you say ? ’ ’ Padriac asked, looking at 
her evilly. Mrs. Higgs began again. 

“Understand me, Mrs. Higgs,” said Padriac coldly. 
“My father’s will was none of mine. Are you blaming me 
for it? You can sue till the moon grows black, and I 
won’t try to stop you. Do you think I’d stand in the way 
of Rose for a few dollars ? ’ ’ 

“Well, now, that’s different,” said Higgs, eyeing him 
keenly. 

“It’s silly to quarrel over money,” said Padriac. 

“Indeed, that’s what I declare and affirm,” said Mrs. 
Higgs heartily. ‘ ‘ I never think of the dirty stuff. So you 
won’t fight us when we break the will and get our rights? 
But that red-headed, that Maveen, she'll do it! And so 
will Bellbender; he ’ll want to give that money to the dirty 
heathen. Not that I begrudge you what your farther left 
you, Padriac. I reckon you worked for it. But Rose and 
me ought to get the rest.” 

Padriac touched Rose’s naked arm. “Rose, you’re not 
angry at me?” he whispered. His fingers shivered. 

“Money?” she asked, as if in a dream. “Money? 
Money! Are you still talking of money? Why, before 
I’d touch the money of Timothy Grady, I’d throw myself 
in the sea!” 

“What’s got into you, Rose?” snarled Mrs. Higgs, as 
Padriac walked away. “It’s all right to talk about fight¬ 
ing the will, but we can’t do it. You got to be nice to 
Padriac. You got to! I see that look in his eyes, dearie; 
he’d marry you in the crack of the whip. And he’s a real 
nice young man.” 

Rose Dawn opened her mouth to speak bitter words. 
But filial obedience and long subjugation to her mother 


290 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


kept her silent. “I’m tired,” was all she said. “Very 
tired tonight, Ma.” 

Mrs. Higgs whimpered, knowing Rose was close to tears, 
and knowing well how she could stop them. “I’ve tried 
and endeavored to do my best for you, dearie,” she la¬ 
mented, “all my life long. I’ve been farther and mother 
both to you. I brought you up out of nothing. Where’d 
you been if it hadn’t been for me?” This rhetorical ques¬ 
tion Rose could not answer. “And now to have you turn 
away from me this way, to know you’re wanting to live 
your own life apart from me, to know you’re thinking 
thoughts your Ma can’t share, to show yourself so selfish, 
not thinking of all I’ve done for you— 0, it’s hard, 

dearie. It’s bitter hard! Some day you’ll know. I hope 
to God you’ll know! I hope to God you’ll suffer as I’ve 
suffered! Bitterer than a dog’s bite is the sneers of an 
ungrateful daughter! ’ ’ 

“I didn’t mean to make you feel bad, Ma,” cried Rose, 
her tender heart hurt that she had hurt another. “I’m 
sorry if I said anything, Ma. ’ ’ 

“0, an ungrateful girl have you been all your life long! ’ 5 
whimpered Mrs. Iliggs. “You ran away and married 
Dawn. And even after he was good and dead you was 
still thinking of him. It was all I could do to make you 
marry Grady. Yet it was for your own good. And what 
thanks do I get? What thanks? 0, dearie, you can’t 
knew—• ’ ’ 

Mrs. Higgs released that stream of red-eyed tears which 
never failed to move Rose Dawn. But something she had 
said had made Rose hard. Without a word she turned 
and looked at the black waters again, which were saltier, 
and deeper, and more drowning than the utmost tears of 
Mrs. Higgs. Mrs. Higgs stopped her sobbing and peered 
cunningly at her daughter. The strange indifference Rose 
showed to her eaterwaulings frightened Mrs. Higgs. 

“You don’t know how I’ve slaved and toiled and sac’- 
ificed to make you what you are, dearie,” she sobbed. 


WOMEN AND WHISKY AND WRATH 


291 


Rose looked wearily at the waters. “I think I do/’ she 
said. 

Now thunderously uprose the moon. A waning half 
moon decrescent. Haze clouds crimsoned it. Lightnings 
muttered. The deep spoke of rain. Par tides rippled on 
Bay Mimayne. Drooping cypresses bent to the waters 
with tears. Upon distant keys palms spread their fanlike 
crests. Motionless they stood, and pondering, heads slanted 
in grave listening. It seemed they harkened to the outer 
ocean. And still the lightnings muttered. 

Old Colonel Dawn watched Rose within the moon’s small 
light. He spoke to Padriac. “Leaving for the No’th soon, 
Mr. Grady?” 

Padriac also looked at Rose. “I don’t know,” he said. 
“I’m in love with your tropics, I think.” 

Old Dawn smiled without laughter. He had heard that 
before. “The beauty of them gets hold of a man,” said 
he. “They’re likely to steal his soul.” 

“I’d never thought of it that way.” 

“I know!” whispered old Dawn. “Take Boosten 
Claude. His father’s father came down with the Yankee 
troops, and stayed. First for a month, and then for a yeai. 
He was buried here. 

“Each year along the time of spring he’d stand on the 
shore and look no’th, snuffing the wind. ‘Pussywillows 
coming out—daisies ’ll soon be by the Weirs,’ he’d say. 
‘I’m going back, Stoughton. I’m going back!’ But here 

he is till judgment. . , . x „ . 

“ Boosten’s father used to talk of going back, too. But 
the heat had got in his bones. First time Boosten ever saw 
snow was this winter, and he’s shivering yet. And Boos- 
ten’s son, if he ever has one, ’ll die if he goes no’th o’ 
Forty. Yet Boosten isn’t half the man his grandfather 

was ’ ’ 

Padriac Grady stared sulkily at old Dawn. “I’ll not 

be like that.” „ 

“The tropics always remind me of a pretty woman, 


292 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


said old Dawn. “A woman yon may see for only a minute 
in the street, but can’t forget for years and years. You’ll 
want her so hard she keeps you from your sleep o’ nights 
and your food o’ days, and you’ll hope there’s a Heaven 
where you can meet her again. I’ve seen a few like that. 
And the older a man is, the harder it is to forget.” 

“I’m not afraid of the tropics,’’ said Padriac coldly. 

Old Dawn nodded sagely. “Love’s queer. One kind of 
love’s not satisfied when a man marries. In the spring we 
see blue eyes; or perhaps a flash of this Southern sky. I’ve 
brought a son into this world, and I’ve outlived him. I’m 
growing old. Yet I remember women!” Old Dawn lit a 
cigar. “A man loved her once—” 

“Loved whom?” asked Padriac dully. 

“Loved the tropics. Who can blame him? John Dawn 
loved her. She stole his soul.” 

Old Dawn walked away, stumbling a little. Rose Dawn’s 
spangled dress gleamed against background of starless pur¬ 
ple night. Now the lightnings muttered. Now the black 
clouds rolled. Long sat Padriac, looking at her. He felt 
the thirst for drink. 

The music died away, and the dance was ended. 

Rose Dawn startled. She saw Laurence Spencer and 
walked towards him. “I want to speak to you profession¬ 
ally, Larry.” The young man bowed; he had never been 
consulted before professionally. “I can’t sleep, Larry,” 
she whispered. “Something’s wrong with me. Can you 
tell me some drug which will make me sleep—soundly?” 

Lauience tightened his cupid mouth. “Opiates are dan¬ 
gerous things, ’ he said. Looking close, he saw indeed 
shadows beneath her eyes. “You oughtn’t to keep such 

late hours,” he said crossly. “It gives wrinkles to anv 
woman.” 

“Wrinkles?” asked Rose, touching her brow. 

“0, wrinkles come after twenty-five. You can’t stop 
’em. ^ Be careful, or they’ll make you lose the lure, Rose. 
They 11 wreck that beautiful, innocent look of yours, Rose, 


WOMEN AND WHISKY AND WRATH 293 


which makes all of us men mad to lie down and let you 
wipe your feet on us. Even you will grow old, Rose! ’ ’ 

Her blue eyes had deepened. Her hand lay on his arm. 
Secret joy seemed to ravish her heart. His arm trembled 
a little at her touch. Yet he was a very uppish young 
man, and the grandson of a Sears, of Boston. 

She was close to him. Big as Laurence was, her eyes 
were level with his own. “I don’t care, Larry,” she said. 
“But it’s hard to grow old alone.” 

Her breath’s still pulsing, her body’s scented odor, her 
curly golden hair’s tickling sweetness, were in his nostrils. 
Her knee touched his knee. Her breast brushed him. 

Laurence drew back, clenching his hands behind him. 
“My 'dear Circe!” he bantered. Vaguely Laurence won¬ 
dered how it would be to clasp his arms about her, bend 
back that lovely face, munch her lips, drown her in kisses! 
What fools men are! Rose’s clear eyes drooped. Lau¬ 
rence took a step backward. He was not tempted; he was 
a Harvard man. 

Yet he knew other men would kill for her. He was con¬ 
scious of Padriac Grady balely staring at him. 

“ ‘Wine is a mocker,’ ” Laurence muttered inanely. 

“Take me home, Larry?” 

“Got to take Maveen. I’ll ask Arsen.” 

“Don’t trouble.” 

“0, no trouble,” said Laurence hastily. 

But as she walked away from him, the goddess yet, Lau¬ 
rence was troubled. He heard falling rain like a thin 
sound of silk tapestries. For a long time he looked at 
Rose, forgetting other women. 

Wigley Arsen brought Rose home through the pouring 
rain. They stood a moment on the Poinsettia’s veranda, 
shaking away water. Both were soaked. Arsen dug drops 
of water out of his ears, wrung dry his mustache. 

Dim light from the door shone on Rose Dawn. Her 
hair was darkened with rain, but was curly as yellow rose 
petals. She stamped her feet. Trickles of water ran down 


294 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


her clear white forehead to her nose. Jewels glittered in 
her long lashes. 

Out of-the shadows stalked up Padriac Grady, breaking 
into Arsen’s good-nights. Grady’s dark hair was rum¬ 
pled to a peak. Even in the dim light his face looked un¬ 
naturally florid. He wavered and staggered. His eyes 
were fierce. 

“What are you doing with Mrs. Grady?” he demanded 
in loud voice. 

“Why, Paddy; what’s the trouble?” asked Arsen nerv¬ 
ously. 

“Trouble yourself to answer me!” Padriac spoke thickly, 
lowering. 

“Well, Paddy—” 

“I’m Mr. Grady to you. Remember that!” 

“Well, Mr. Grady,” Arsen stuttered, growing red and 
cold. “I brought Rose home—” 

“Mrs. Grady, you!” 

“Why, Paddy, don’t you remember the old days in 
New Haven—” 

Padriac raised his hand. His breath hissed. With an 
inarticulate roar he ran his fingers through his hair, rum¬ 
pling it further. Arsen was appalled. He deemed he 
saw ghosts. It was the very image of old Tim Grady come 
to life again! In the darkness, roaring, shaking his fists, 
old Tim Grady come back from death again! And Arsen 
remembered that cry he had heard on the Thorn earlier that 
night, the cry of the dreadful dead! 

“Speak quick!” snarled Padriac. “None of your 
bounding insolence to me! I’ll not stand for it!” 

Arsen stuttered. He drew back. 

“I’ve watched you long enough,” said Padriac omi¬ 
nously. “I’ve had my eye on you long enough!” Did he 
say “ye”? 

He lifted back his fist, straight behind his shoulder. 
Pace by pace Wigley Arsen stumbled back. Pace for 
pace Padriac followed him up. 



WOMEN AND WHISKY AND WRATH 


295 


‘‘Out till this hour of the night with Rose!” he shouted. 
“Get off! Get away! Get out! Get out, before I forget 
I’m a gentleman!” 

“What—” 

“I’ll strangle you!” foamed Padriac. “I’ll strangle 
you! ’ ’ 

The roaring voice of old Tim Grady! Devils in the 
rain! 

Arsen’s heel caught on the steps, and he stumbled and 
tumbled down. Grady’s fist swung at him, just missing. 
Arsen sat down in a puddle. 

Cast away, cast out, as had been old Thornwood Clay. 
Arsen had not raised voice then. No one raised voice now. 
Out into the roaring rain, the tropical night, the rushing 
gutters of the street. Thrown like a dog into the mud. 
Arsen sat in the puddle till he knew that it was wet. 

He slunk away, gasping curses, utterly confounded. 
Rose had gone inside the Poinsettia, cold and still. Cold 
and still as steel. Cold as white heat. 

After several unsteady lurches, Padriac hiccoughed and 
followed her. 

Padriac Grady had got drunk. 

Women and whisky and wrath! 


LX. THE DREADFUL HOUR 

O N you, Gay Deleon—gay Gay Deleon—has come 
your dreadful hour! 

Think now of Weinvoll, rotting behind bars 
for a sin you did! Think of old Thorn Clay, starving in 
the cold! Think of mighty Dusty Hoag, shot with lead 
through the mouth ! Think of old Tim Grady! Think of 
Dot, of your women! Think of John Dawn! Tes, think 

of death! 

The roulet wheel spins in the Mimayne Club; the ball 
clicks; fortune flickers; men watch with cold dead eyes. 


296 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Dead men, the living-in-death. They have no hope, and 
no hereafter, but money, which is soon spent. 

Jake the croupier has face of limestone and pale long 
yellow hair. He wears a short green baize kirtle. Steadily 
he handles his rake. All men about the wheel are in eve¬ 
ning dress, save for a uniform or two. A man without a 
white shirt front has no business gambling. At all places 
else, the Royal Poinsettia, the Deepsea Club, ballroom, 
billiard-alley, or boudoir, knickered tweeds are supreme. 
But here the Angel Azazael might not enter without din¬ 
ner coat. 

Deleon came in. The old black door-attendant tried to 
push him forth again. “You can’t come in, sah!” But 
Deleon came. 

Men turn in curiosity. A glance, and they are back at 
the table, restlessly stacking their chips. Jake does not 
turn up his chalky face, but deep lines in it harden. A 
droop comes to his eyes. 

As the wheel died two or three men spoke to Deleon, 
keeping at respectful distance. “Out on bail?” groaned 
Urban Wiggs, that fat dull fool. “Hear my father will 
appear for you. Damned shame!” 

Somehow Deleon had managed to get shaved and bathed, 
and into dinner clothes. The click of the wheel brought 
lights to his black eyes. He threw back his head. The 
rolling dice! 

Once again the bravera, the king of fickle fortune, 
the lord of women. He should have worn cape and rapier, 
walked with plume in his hat. For the instant it might 
be seen why many women, fair and high and holy, had 
loved Gay Deleon. Poltroon, no doubt of it; sharp, un- 
veracious, unprincipled, unsteadfast, fickle as water. Yet 
a pretty thief of hearts, a knave of good sharp deeds, a lord 
in his own right by the law which says any scoundrel, but 
no merchant, is a gentleman. 

“Bail!” Deleon sneered to fat Urban Wiggs. He 
chuckled fearfully. “ Two—fool—cops! Two fool cops, 


THE DREADFUL HOUR 


297 


shooting craps in the jail. I got in their game with sixty 
cents, and cleaned them right. ’ ’ Deleon stifled with laugh¬ 
ter. ‘‘And then I rolled them for the keys!” He giggled. 
“I come back!” he boasted. “Luck doesn’t run against 
me forever! ’ ’ 

“They’ll be looking for you,’’ said Urban Wiggs grimly. 

“Let them find me ! If I had money—” 

Deleon cast a wad of dirty bills to Jake. He was in¬ 
different to the hushed hostility. He was free, and his 
luck would turn. He had money in his pocket. The roll¬ 
ing wheel! 

The wheel spun. Silently sat Jake with his cold stone 
face. Not once did Deleon win, though he scattered bets 
like rain. Buoyancy left him. In a monotone he cursed 
all devils. His glance was steady and blazing. Over and 
over he counted the chips left him. They dwindled. None 
were left. Not one. 

“Lend me some money, Wiggs!” 

Urban sneered, wagging his head. He stuck his fat 
hands in his pockets, turning the broad of his back to Del¬ 
eon. “You’re done,” he said. 

“It’s a three!” screamed Deleon. “Watch it roll! I’ve 

got the hunch!” 

And three turned up. Two more numbers Deleon 
called, feeling prophetic fervor in him. But he wasn’t 
betting. The bettors watched Deleon curiously. They 
were superstitious, or they would not gamble. The stony 
croupier smiled. He did not believe in second sight. 

“It’s a nine!” cried Deleon, working his hands in 
spasms. “God! If I had money! Nine! . . . It’s win¬ 
ning . . . winning . . . winning. ... It’s nine! What 
did I tell you ? I might have made a million dollars! 

Lend me money, Wiggs !” 

The floor seemed to rock and reel beneath him. lhe 
hunch surely came from Heaven, from that God who is 
providential to gamblers. His luck had turned! His luck 
had turned at last. But if he should not seize it - 


298 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


"Lend me money, Jake!” 

That stone man said nothing. After a long time his 
wrinkles cleft into a grin. "Not just yet,” he said wearily. 
"You get out!” 

The wheel was a spinning top. Its whirring song mad¬ 
dened Deleon. Smiles of winners. Hissing breath of 
losers. Crackling green money. Chip clicking on chip. A 
drunken man who bawled continually: "All right! All 
right! I’ll pay!” and kept fishing from his pockets to¬ 
bacco coupons. 

White levin in the air. The rolling dice! Money! 
Silent voices screamed to Gay Deleon: "You might have 
won, Gay Deleon! Why don’t you gamble, Gay Deleon? 
We’re with you, Gay Deleon!” His fevered blood burst 
his heart. His lungs could not contain his breath. 

Men scowled at him. The sight of the broken is pleasant 
to neither lucky nor unlucky. Win or lose. ... Or lose, 
but each man, pray God, the gentleman! Let him blow 
out his brains in his own way, and not spatter his friends ’ 
dress shirts. 

Jake lifted his basilisk eyes. Pale were they as the 
moon, their lashes colorless. "I said to clear out, Deleon, 
and let the gentlemen gamble! ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ Lend me money! ’ ’ 

Urban Wiggs’s broad back was maddening to Deleon. 
He beat his fists on it. He gripped Wiggs by the collar 
band. "Don’t! Don’t!” Wiggs groaned, near to apo¬ 
plexy. ‘ ‘ Don’t knife me, Deleon! ’ ’ 

"Lend me money! I can win!” 

Hands seized him hard. A blow smote him on the ear. 
He was kicked down steps. "Clear out, you dirty 
mucker!” Loud clapped the gates of Hell behind him. 
He lay in the gutter. 

Creeping along down dark streets, he found McGinty’s 
swift blue racer. Deleon’s hands shook on the wheel. 
Glances cast on him by passers-by terrified him. He 
crouched low. Courage had gone out of him. He saw 


THE DREADFUL HOUR 


299 


ghosts creeping in foul alleys. He was in the grip of cold 
spasms. 

But one more hope remained. Always hope. By devi¬ 
ous unlighted ways he drove to the Poinsettia. He crept 
up a back way to Laurence’s room. No one saw him. Or 
if one did, it was only a black maid whose silence Deleon 
rewarded by smile or kiss. 

Laurence was away dancing at the Deepsea Club. En¬ 
tering the unlocked door, Deleon felt about in the black¬ 
ness. Spencer should have money; he always had it. Del¬ 
eon could find nothing. He sought the bureau, and in a 
drawer found Laurence’s pistol, heavy and black. Deleon 
pocketed this. 

His stealthy fingers played music on the walls. Hate¬ 
fully he tore all things his hand could find, dumping out 
drawers on the floor, stamping on them. It was a childish 
act. He smashed a picture. But he found no money. 

Deleon pulled at a closet door which held firm against 
his tugs. With cold fright Deleon hesitated, laying ear 
to the panels. He heard the hushed pulsing of the vapor¬ 
ous night; a hissing soft, continually breathless as the 
sound of rain on leaves. Creakingly the door gave, it be¬ 
gan to swing ajar. Black were the shadows in the unlit 
room! In the widening crack Deleon saw the gleam of 
eyes. 0, dreadful hour! Shape of doom! 

“Who are you?” thinly moaned the shivering night. 
“Who are you?” 

Deleon fled. He scrambled from the window and 
dropped down a sturdy wistaria to the grass. Amidst 
bushes he lay, gasping. Roaringly his heart pumped great 
floods through the portals of his ears. He dared not look 
above. A bird screamed at him. Shadows shook their 
snaky hair. 

He crawled away on all fours, whining in his throat. 
On the steps of the hotel veranda he saw Arethusa Weinvoll 
sitting alone, her chin in her palms, looking up at the black 
clouds. Faint he heard the music of dancing at the Deep- 


300 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


sea Club. Arethusa turned her head, and her milk-white 
breast flashed silver for an instant. Deleon scrambled 
silently through the bushes along the veranda, and hid near 
the steps. 

For minutes he watched the girl. She did not stir 
again. Late strollers clumped about the porch, their 
whispers dwindling thin as smoke. Minutes passed heavily 
while Deleon watched. Arethusa was rich. But more, she 
was a woman. 

Lovely she seemed in the darkness, white and soft and 
young. His heart lightened; he brushed back his hair. 
Life is not to be despaired of. Money and women! Softly 
Deleon whispered: ‘‘Arethusa! Be quiet. Don’t say 
anything. Come away with me ! ’ ’ 

She went in the blue racer with him. Nothing she asked; 
but they spoke together in many whispers. Such drowsing 
converse was theirs as throaty pigeons know. Her shoul¬ 
der beneath his arm warmed Deleon’s heart. He even 
dared to hum a tune, in this, his dreadful hour! 

Dark night! Trees closed over the spinning road. No 
sky shone through. Southward went the blue racer under 
branches forming a tunnel. Trees whispered; they sawed 
their ominous boughs. Southward Deleon drove down the 
white road beside the cypress swamps. He passed a squad 
of men with guns and ropes in their hands. Dogs leaped 
from before his headlights’ spears. 

“If you see the nigger Tom—” the cry died behind him. 

Steam in the air. Dark night. Awaited him the Black 
King! 

Up came the burning moon in haze. A gibbous cheek, a 
half a face, the red eye of the demon! Clouds flurried 
past in horror. Up stood the burning moon in mist. 

By the road’s edge Deleon halted, by the margin of 
the cypress swamps. Shrilly hummed myriad insects. 
Hoarsely boomed the ancient sea. The swamps so near 
seeped! seeped ! with a treacherous sound of tears. A bush 
stirred. A bush beside his hand was stirring. 


THE DREADFUL HOUR 


301 


Down tlie black way behind dogs began to bark. 

With rustle loud as rain an owl broke through branches. 
On shadowy, silent wings it fled towards the moon. “ Be¬ 
ware!” its pinions whispered. “Beware of the Black 
King! ’ ’ 

Deleon did not hear. The girl lay in the bend of his 
arm. Kisses they gave, and took again, as though their 
thirst burned creation. Deep, as though the sea were 
turned to lips. Slow, as though the world would never 
end. 

0, dreadful hour! 

The bushes crashed. Out of the black uprose the black 
king! 

Out of the black giant Tom Jefferson. Away and deep 
the dogs. Huge, famished, terrible as a panther, with 
gaunt and flaming eyes, with knotted arms, leaped giant 
Tom. Deleon did not have time to scream. The giant had 
grabbed his pistol. 

Madly Deleon writhed and tore. He threshed his feeble 
fists. Now he was dangling in the air like a spider, danc¬ 
ing like a man who hangs. Stars reddened. Roared the 
void. Death had him by the throat. 

“And you, you pretty crying thing—” 

Arethusa screamed. She tore her cheeks. Leaping out, 
she fled down the stone road. Great death upon her trail. 
Screaming yet! The black king had overtaken her. . . . 

“Wo-o! Wo-o!” bay the dogs. 

‘ 1 Who-o ! Who-o! Woe to who ? ’ ’ cries the rushing owl. 

Rain comes. 

Yet sounds the sea. It will sound forever. 

Down the road, creeping into the edges of the swamps, 
flare murky yellow torches. They are smoky stars. Rain 
hisses on them. They dip in and out amidst trees and 
grasses. Men shout to one another as they thresh about. 
Their eyes gleam whitely. Their hands shake. Now one 
has fallen in a slough. Men rush together, forming a chain 
to drag him out. 


302 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Vacantly twitter birds disturbed in sleep. They rustle 
away on whirring wings. Little beasts run with a soft pat! 
pat! Mosquitoes drone into the rain, and die with drag¬ 
gled wings. Things crawl and writhe within the foul noc¬ 
turnal quags. Loudly booms the deep, triumphant baying 
of hounds. They whine around bushes, dive into dark re¬ 
cesses with slavering tongues. 

Boosten Claude runs down the road, waving a torch 
aloft. Shadowy saffron circles flare before him, but they 
vanish out. Claude’s knife-face is steel. He bellows 
deeply to his .men. His voice is drowned in echoes. 
Torches dip in answer to him through the woods, through 
the morasses. 

“We’ve got the line about him. We’ll get him in the 
morning!” 

There in the bushes lies Gay Deleon. One foot (those 
dancing feet) is twisted beneath him. His head lies on 
the stone road (it has known softer pillows!). Bloated 
mosquito clouds whine in the rain. They sing a requiem. 

“Don’t touch it, men! Call off that damned hound! 
You, Arsen, take charge of this girl. Make her stop her 
screaming.” 

Screaming yet, Arethusa sits on the rain-soaked road, 
tearing at her hair. 

Gay Deleon, the debonair! A hundred women loved 
him. Come to this! 

For all your sins, Gay Deleon, let us pray. You loved 
life; the way you went was sweet. To yourself you were 
no villain. Each man unto himself is no villain. Ah, 
gay Gay Deleon, your dreadful hour! For all your sins, 
Gay Deleon, we will pray. 

Loudly yammer the belling hounds. From branch to 
branch Tom swings himself away. Dogs cannot follow 
on those scummy pools below. But still he sees the torches 
flaring, twinkling in and out. Still he hears the shouts of 
men as they enlarge their courages, shouting each to each. 


THE DREADFUL HOUR 


303 


Still lie sees them crawling down the road, long guns in 
the crooks of their arms, their eyes lean. 

The great rain falls. Soon it will be gray day. 

An owl whirls by with great yellow eyes. 11 Beware! 
Beware of the Black King!” Its wingtips sting his face. 

Gaunt, silent, hard of glance, the posse men stand about 
Gay Deleon. They are a tribe of bitter warriors gathered 
at the bier and pyre of a king struck down in war. Flick¬ 
ering shadows leap. Saffron smokes flare and flaw. Lean 
yellow tongues of fiery pine-knots sizzle thinly. 

“I always liked him,” says Boosten Claude. “I never 
really wanted to shoot him. Now God have mercy on his 
soul! ’ ’ 

The torches, held in a circle, stand as candles of the 
death-night watch. 


LXI. “BREAK! BREAK! BREAK!” 

I ^HE little Weinvoll girl says it was young Spen¬ 
cer,” said old Dawn. “But she’s hysterical, 
Boosten. And she’s a born liar. She couldn’t 
tell the truth.” 

“We’ve got the nigger in a net,” said Claude grimly. 
“He can’t break free!” 

Old Dawn put fists on his desk. “Let the law take its 
course when you get him, Boosten. I’ll not tolerate any¬ 
thing else!” 

Claude sucked in his breath. “Better take a vacation, 
Colonel,” he said with haggard laughter. 

‘ ‘ I say the law will be obeyed! ’ ’ cried old Dawn, spring¬ 
ing up. 

“And I say I don’t give that for your law!” 

Fierce the straight black browns of old Stoughton Dawn. 
Invincible his-glances. “Boosten Claude,” he said softly, 
“the Dawns don’t take their words in vain. I’ve sworn 


304 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


to keep one law for black man and white. I ’ll keep it! ” 

Boosten Claude shifted his gaze. “Why did the Wein- 
voll girl try to accuse young Spencer, you think, Colonel?” 

“The natural born habit of a liar in lying.” 

Laurence Spencer was aware of whispering glances on 
him that next morning. When he came to the beach at 
noon a small earthquake arose. Bathers followed him curi¬ 
ously. An old gentleman wheezed, and threw down his 
newspaper, and put on his glasses, and plunged out into the 
safe sea. 

“ It’s said he killed Deleon ! ’ ’—‘ ‘ Good riddance. ’ ’—‘ ‘ And 
that little Bunnie Hoag’s been missing three days. Do 
you think—?”—“No! Do you?”—“No. It’s not pos¬ 
sible.” 

Mary Dubby, shy in a little bathing suit, sat down by 
Laurence at the edge of the rising tide, and chewed gum. 
She dabbled her heels in the surf foam. She conversed 
kindly with Laurence. Asked him what made the sea so 
sad. Asked him why the sky was blue. Asked him what 
was a Portuguese man-of-war which on the white sand ex¬ 
pired through all its purple streamers. Asked him if 
cocoa came from coconuts. 

The rising tide lapped at their knees. Laurence remem¬ 
bered he was a Harvard man, and told her everything. 

Mary asked why he hadn’t shot Deleon, as William Hart 
does. Asked him why he hadn’t smashed in his head with 
a rock, as Douglas Fairbanks does. Asked him why he 
hadn’t leaped on his back and bitten off his ears, as John 
Barrymore does. Asked him if he believed in love. Asked 
him to fish for a sand-chigoe which hopped down her back. 

The rising tide washed out the sand from beneath them. 
They scrambled up. Mary Dubby had been filled with a 
very definite idea. She knew Higgleson Todd, floating out 
in the waves, his great paunch looking like a watermelon 
in striped green suit, was watching her. Mary seemed very 
fair in her little silk costume, so much like a silk hand¬ 
kerchief. Her hair shone yellow. Higgleson Todd had a 


“BREAK! BREAK! BREAK!” 


305 


passion for blonds. He grew jealous, as Mary had hoped. 

With a grunt and splash he turned his mountainous 
girth and paddled for shore. “You know Mr. Spencer?” 
asked Miss Dubby, by way of introduction. 

“Hello, Mr. Todd. I didn’t know this young lady—” 
Laurence was unaware of Mary’s name. He hesitated 
about calling her a lady, but thought Todd might expect 
it. “I didn’t know she —” 

“Didn’t know she’s my wife?” asked Todd unpleasantly. 

Laurence turned, irritated by Todd’s tone. It was the 
first time (though I hope not the last) he was not a gentle¬ 
man. 

‘ 1 Three, ’ ’ murmured Mary in a voice of silent triumph. 

“Three what?” grunted Todd. 

“I’ve been reading some of your law books, Mr. Hig- 
gleson.” 

“You startle me,” sneered Todd. “Do you know your 
alphabet ? ’ ’ 

“And I’ve learned it’s law that if a man introduces a 
girl three times as his wife, she is his wife, just as good as 
by church and book. First there was Mr. Padriac Grady, 
and then Colonel Dawn, and then—” 

‘‘Dictation!’’ roared Todd. “You little devil!’’ 

“And there are other laws,” said Miss Dubby quietly, 
but surely. 

“Dictation!” howled Todd, out of his wits. “You sap! 
—No, no! Good girl—Mary! Where are you going?” 

“We might as well go to the church and make it re¬ 
ligious,” said Miss Dubby. “It’s legal already.” 

‘ ‘ Dictation ! Dictation ! Dictation! ’ ’ gasped Todd, run¬ 
ning after her. 

And never thereafter did Mr. Higgleson Todd call Mrs. 
Higgleson by the unkind name of sap. 

Laurence saw Maveen on the beach with Schermerhorn; 
she returned his greeting with casual smoke from her ciga- 
ret. Disconsolately Laurence sat down on the sand, listen¬ 
ing to the sea. “Break! Break! Break!” roared the 


306 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


threshing surf. Laurence put his hand to his heart. He 
was not surprised to find it unbroken. 

“What’s the use of love?” he thought. 

And then he thought of little Bunnie Hoag. And then 
of Rose Dawn. 

In far New York the Morning Mist was weeping for Del¬ 
eon. Thanks to Arsen being on the job, it wept five 
minutes before any other paper. Wrathfully the Mist 
scorched those scurrilous, lying, libelous metropolitan pa¬ 
pers which had ever intimated Deleon killed Tim Grady. 
The Mist was answered by marked silence, obviously sign 
of guilt. That the Mist had been first to accuse Deleon 
diminished not the least its upright, self-right, all right 
righteousness. 

It questioned who was this Laurence Spencer. Was he 
not son of the vivisectionist Dr. Russel Spencer? Not son 
of Mrs. Spencer, who had been a Boston Sears ? How could 
good come out of Boston ? And he was a medical student. 
That clinched it. There (it is alleged) is the man who 
killed Tim Grady! With his alleged hand he did it. He 
carved Tim’s alleged heart. 

Every one knows medical students creep forth at night 
to kidnap ragged little slum children, using them for vivi¬ 
section. Every one knows they eat the hearts of their liv¬ 
ing patients to put iron in their blood and make their 
beards grow long. And worse. He was a Harvard stu¬ 
dent. The Mist screamed forth: “Another Harvard Man 
Gone Wrong!” 

It published cartoons, photographs, leading editorials, 
and the opinions of great crime investigators. “Anthony 
refuses to give opinion! ” it cried. The truth was Anthony 
had kicked the Mist s reporter on the heels and pushed 
him out the door. That was opinion enough. 

A page of pictures showed the Thorn; the Grady wed¬ 
ding ; Dawnrose; Tim Grady at the age of forty; the eat¬ 
ing house in Moline where Mrs. Higgs began her’brilliant 
career ’ a Florida tomato j Rose Dawn in i i Sin ’ ’ j the oce^p • 


“BREAK! BREAK! BREAK!” 


307 


and a flashlight of Coney Island in August, labeled Mid¬ 
night Revels in Biscayne.” 

’Tis an ill murder which blows no one good. The Mist s 
owner, the secret man behind the guns, the father of the 
Arty Girl, ordered an increase in Arsen’s salary. Perhaps 
he was gladdest of all men Gay Deleon had gone to Hell. 

“I see by the papers,” said puny little Citizen A, “that 
the Grady case is up again. I’d like to punch somebody’s 




“Rose Dawn is the woman behind it,” said hideous Citi¬ 
zen B. “Women have loved me. I know what they are.” 
“Sure she did it!” said A. “Remember how she knifed 

that man in ‘Sin’?” t 

“She’ll be great in the movies now,” said B. Every¬ 
body goes to see a murderess.” 

“I don’t believe a word of it!” said C. ‘Id never look 


at her again!” 

But he stepped into Gus Bliss’s pawnshop, where he gave 
his watch for money to see Rose Dawn again. 


LXII. HEART BLOOD 



OLEMN Ike Duval found Dinnis McGinty at last, up 
an alley. McGinty took to his heels, but in three 
strides Ike was stepping on them. Ike clapped 
heavy hand on McGinty’s shoulder. 

“Not so fast, my friend!” 

McGinty gobbled. The oaths he released to the sunlight 
were many and vile. He reeked like a laboratory with 
low stenches. Beneath Ike’s steel fingers his rum-soaked 
muscles, were like sponge. He quivered hugely as a 


stranded whale. , 

“Cut out that there profanity! 

“I’ll cuss when I . . . pl’ase, and where I • • • P A ase > 
and as much and as loud as I . . . pl’ase—and ask no 

hilp of any man! ’ ’ 


308 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


In lieu of the dots substitute the names of any devils 
you like. 

“What are ye after-r chasing me far-r, ye flat-foot?” 
yelled McGinty. “I ain’t doing nothing to ye. Did auld 
Todd sic ye on to me?” 

Ike Duval released his hard fingers. “Have a cigar,” 
he offered, trying to smile ingratiatingly. “I’d like to 
have a word with you, McGinty.” He gave a slap to Mc¬ 
Ginty’s back. “You’re all right, Mac.” 

Justly, McGinty was suspicious. “Todd’s after-r me 
far-r tr-rying to stick up Doc Spincer. It ain’t that?” 

“You and me want to be friends, Mac. Buv a drink 
Mac.” 

^ McGinty pocketed Ike’s five dollar bill, still suspicious. 
“What’s this far-r, if I may be so bol-ld as to inquire?” 

“Money talks.” 

McGinty nodded. “But I don’t,” he said shrewdly. 

On a barrel and a soap-box in the alley he and Ike 
sat down. They spat. Ike pushed his derby back on his 
head, and pulled up his pants to show his white cotton 
socks. Silently he smoked, his jaws working. McGinty 
chewed his cigar. 

“What’s the game?” asked McGinty bluntly. 

“I’m going to be frank with you, Mac,” said Ike, trying 
to look frank. He paused.—“Who was the man with 
amber glasses?” he shouted abruptly. 

McGinty drew into himself. His eyes grew cunning 
“What man?” 

I m on a trail, Mac.” Ike wagged his forefinger. “I 
like you, Mac. I want to’be frank with you. Did I ever 
tell you my mother was born in Ireland?” 

“God rist yer mither’s bones!” said McGinty, “for 
with ye er son, tis in sorrowment she must have gone 
down to her grave! ’ ’ 

“On^the day before Tim Grady was killed,” said Ike 
lowly, “a man with a red wig and amber glasses got off 
the Gold Express. Who was that man, McGinty?” 


HEART BLOOD 


309 


“Why should I know, if I may be so bol-ld as to in¬ 
quire ? ’ ’ 

“You’ve got a good memory for faces. I’ve heard you 

say you never forget a man.” 

“Aye, that I don’t. At fir-rst I didn’t know him, but 

when I remimbered me—” 

“Who was that man beneath the false hair and the am¬ 
ber glassest” 

McGinty drew back. “I will not ope me mouth!” 
“Watch out, McGinty! You’re due for twenty years 
in New York State!” 

“Ye have no war-rant to arrist me! I know where I 
can hide.” 

“I’ll get the warrant, Din McGinty! I’ll slam you in 
the coop! Speak up! Unclamp your trap! Who was 
that man?” 

“I will not ope me mouth!” said Dinnis McGinty 
grimly. “For he did favar-r to Dinnis McGinty, and he is 
me fri’nd. I’ve clasped his hand in the clasp o’ fillowship. 
Now may ye roar on, flat-foot, while yer belly holds 

wind.” 

“So he’s your friend, is he?” 

“ Ay! I forgit me not of a man, inimy or fri ’nd. Did 
he not save me pussycat at risk of his own nick? I 11 say 
no war-rd against him! ” 

“So it was him!” roared Ike Duval, slapping his thighs. 
“I knew it all along. I’ve got him now. By God, he’ll 

hang for killing old Tim Grady! ^ 

“ ’Twas who, ye fool? What are ye after-r now? 

“I’m after you, McGinty!” scowled Ike. I \e got 
enough from you. Hand back that five! . 

“What have I said?” cried McGinty in anguish. I 

did not ope me mouth!” 

“Hand back that five, McGinty! Hand back that 

cigar!” t 

“Yer mither was bar-rn in auld Ire-land!” shrieked 

McGinty. “She was bar-rn in Edinboro!’’ 


310 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


All day the face of Solemn Ike Duval was dreadful as 
a hangman’s. All day Solemn Ike Duval nursed secret 
determination to his breast, as a girl might nurse a sweet 
shameful love-child. But Solemn Ike Duval remembered 
the boldness of that man who had risked high death for 
a black cat, who had flicked his thumbs at danger a thou¬ 
sand times, whom Solemn Ike Duval had seen times with¬ 
out end make love to death as other men make love to 
love. And courage left Solemn Ike Duval. 

That afternoon he was one of seven men who went down 
to the Thorn, searching that ghost which had screamed at 
Wigley Arsen. They went massed. Each man liked to 
feel the sturdy bumping of his neighbors’ shoulders. At 
the plank they straggled out in single file, Schermerhorn, 
old Colonel Dawn, van Chuch, Ike, and Todd, with Arsen 
and Red the Sailor lingering at the rear. 

11 It’s all foolishness, ’ ’ growled Wigley Arsen. ‘ ‘ Foolish¬ 
ness! Why can’t men be sensible. An educated man 
would never believe in ghosts. Red the Sailor is supersti¬ 
tious. I would have investigated his story myself last night 
if I’d had time. I’d never believe in ghosts.” 

“Aw, Mr. Arsen,” muttered Red. “Year—” 

“Red claims he ueard the howling,” said Arsen more 
loudly. “He’s superstitious. All sailors are superstitious. 
A sensible man would have investigated.” 

“Loud as thunder it was,” said Red the Sailor. “It’s 
a ha’nt. It’s a ghostie. It yells—‘0 Arsen! Murdered 
for a woman!’ it yells.” 

“Pipe down, Red,” said van Chuch sharply. “If there 
was really any cry, Mr. Arsen would have heard it. 
You’re a fool.” 

Schermerhorn bent almost double, creeping like a cinema 
Indian. “Merry trouble, dear old fools,” he said. “Hope 
it is a ghost. ’ ’ 

They crowded to the cabin door. Silence from within 
was absolute. All shrill sounds of the still afternoon 
pierced their eardrums as they waited. But no soue4 


HEART BLOOD 


311 


from the cabin where old Tim Grady died. Old Dawn 
pounded. 

“Who’s there? Open up ! We’re ready to shoot!” 
Arsen lagged behind, and Red the Sailor lingered at the 
gangplank. “Go on in,” suggested Arsen heartily. 
“What are we afraid of?” 

Schermerhorn kicked the door wide. He bent beneath 
the crosstree. “I’ll show you gay lads what-o, he prom¬ 
ised. “Here’s what—” 

Over the threshold he stumbled. His arms flopped up. 
He leaped forward on fours like a greyhound. Between 
his long legs squirmed out a little writhing figure, dodging 
between the arms which entangled as they reached for him. 
It was Greasy Pete Lopez, in his right hand (so quick and 
cunning) the heavy serpent knife! None dared to shoot. 

Steel flashed in Pete’s lifted hand. 

Old Dawn braced himself. His black eyes were furious. 
“You little hound! Get him! I’ll get him!” He 
knocked Ike Duval aside and leaped for that squirming 

fellow. His old arms were tough. 

The blade flashed. The knife plunged into his ribs, 

pulled out again. 

Before he had fallen, holding hard to his breast, hoarsely 
gasping, Greasy Pete had dodged past Ike and van Chuch. 
He bounded towards the gangplank. With blood-curdling 
scream and threatening bloody blade he bowled Red the 
Sailor aside. He leaped to the dock and loped madly 
away, quick as those coyotes from whom he’d learned his 

tricks. 

Ike jerked at his gun. He snapped it over his wrist. 
He spat out shots. Greasy Pete vanished in the palm 
groves. On sturdy legs van Chuch and Ike Duval beat 
through the palms after him, from the river to the Royal 
Poinsettia clear down to the bay front. But it would be 
a long dark day before they would see Greasy Pete again. 

“So he’s the ghostie’s been swiping my eight-bells chow,” 
growled Red. “I warn’t afraid o’ him. I’d like to break 


312 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


his ne^k myself. He swiped a chicken san’wich offen me 
last night. ” 

Old Colonel Dawn lay on the Thorn’s white deck, pale 
and still. Through shirt and coat welled a little bubble 
of blood, so old and thick from that old stiff heart. Arsen 
felt his breast, which was still fluttering. They broke off 
a door; and put him on it tenderly; and carried him away. 

That night Arsen telephoned Anthony in New York. A 
hardness strange to him had fallen on Wigley Arsen, a 
terrified determination at the face of death. He could 
hardly speak over the singing wires. 

Anthony, Greasy Pete Lopez stabbed Colonel Stoughton 

Dawn; and he’s dying. He’s dying! His heart blood’s 
going fast—” 

The singing wires seemed to tremble. Arsen felt elec¬ 
tricity tingling his hand. 

I m coming at once! ” he heard the singing wires. 

Anthony Anthony coming to Biscayne, where Ike Duval 
awaited with the law! The telephone had gone dead. Ar¬ 
sen rang up again. 

Anthony! Are you listening ? That serpent knife you 
had— ’ ’ 

Anthony swore. “I told you I gave it back to Tim 
Grady. It was his.” 

Anthony,” asked Arsen darkly, pressing his mouth to 
the transmitter. “Do you still think I’m a fool, An- 
thony?” 

But the connection was dead. 


LXIII. WHY THOSE TEARS, LADY? 

R OSE DAWN staring in her mirror. Looking for 
those wrinkles, perhaps, which Laurence had said 
would come. Dark crescents below her clear blue 
eyes had deepened. She pulled up an eyelid and saw veins 
upon the ball. 


WHY THOSE TEARS, LADY? 


313 


Her mother pounded on the door. ‘ 1 Rose! Rose! 
What are you doing? I won’t let you not mind me. Be¬ 
have yourself ! Let me in ! ” 

The door was locked. Rose waited silently. Again she 
looked in her mirror. 

Glance for glance she was answered back. The glass 
held as much beauty as the gazer, though less immortal 
soul. Yet why speak of a soul where beauty is concerned? 
Many men would love no more than that image in the 
glass. 

A soul is nothing much. It may be saved, be washed, 
be born again, be defeated, suffer anguish, fall in love. 
Beauty is much more. Men crawl on their knees for it, 
and spend money on it, and sigh for it, and want to marry 
it, and bleat and grunt and baa at it, and offer thevr use¬ 
less souls to it. There is a gift measurable in dollars and 
cents; or in imported cars and chinchilla wraps, if beauty 
prefers to take its pay more ladylikely. 

But Rose Dawn had a soul. Old Tim Grady, Higgleson 
Todd, van Chuch, Gay Deleon, Schermerhorn, Arsen, had 
loved no more than that image in the glass; had loved a 
lovely face which soon must wither, gold curls which soon 
must fade, blue eyes which soon must shadow. John Dawn 
had loved her. He of all men alone had loved her for her 
tender spirit. 

Rose Dawn was crying in her peculiar whimpering way, 
pouring no tears, voicing no rending sobs. Mrs. Higgs 
had taught her long ago that it is not nice to give way to 
passions. 

Rose smoothed her shining curls with nervous fingers. 
She darkened the sedgy lashes which fringed her clear blue 
eyes. She touched her lips with scarlet. Patted pink into 
her cheeks. Rubbed the shadows below her eyes. Lovely, 
lovely Rose Dawn! No man might know your heart was 

stone. . 

“You let me in, Rose ! I never saw you so disobedient! 

Rose shuddered. She had never disobeyed her mother 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


314 

before. It was as terrible as the first time a man curses 
God. 

Mrs. Higgs’s frizzled blond locks appeared over the 
transom. She was standing on a chair in the hallway. 
Her little blue eyes twinkled furiously. Her wagging chin 
rested on the transom ledge, making her head bob up and 
down. 

“What are you primping yourself up for? What are 
you doing these days? I’ll not stand for it. I got a 
mother’s rights! Let me in ! ’ ’ 

Rose stood up, her back to her dressing table. Still 
afraid; but defiance grew in her, such as Higgs had never 
seen. 

“I’m going to see Colonel Dawn,” Rose said steadily to 
that frizzled fury at the transom. “He’s dying. I want 
him to take me as a daughter! Ma, Ma, don’t think I’m 
disobedient. But he’s all that’s left of Johnny Dawn—” 

She stopped a sob. She put her handkerchief to her 
mouth. 

“You won’t!” howled Higgs. “You’ll have nothing to 
do with them Dawns! We’re through with them! I hope 
the whole race dies and rots, son and father! Now, you 
mind me! I’m going to get you married all pretty to 
Padriac. Let me in! Let me in! I’ll make you regret 
this, young lady!” 

“I'll never marry any one,” whispered Rose steadily. 
“I’ve got my own life. It’s mine! It’s mine!” 

“Well, of all unnatchel children!” gasped Higgs. 
What is the world coming to ? You impudent young one ! 
Let me in! I’m going to take you away. We’re going to 
leave Biscayne at once!” 

Rose shook her head. She had defied her mother and 
found that she still lived on. Lightning did not smite 
her. She still retained her senses. Strange it was. From 
her earliest recollection Ma Higgs had taught her that 
things unimaginable happen to children who defy their 


WHY THOSE TEARS, LADY? 


315 


parents. God always makes them idiots and sends them 
down to Hell. 

* 1 1 Tn going to see Colonel Dawn, ’ ’ she said lowly. ‘ ‘ And 
then I don’t care if I die.” She shuddered. “No,” she 
whispered. “My mind is made up.” 

Mrs. Higgs grew frightened. “All I’ve done for you, 
dearie,” she sobbed, using that tearful recourse which 
never failed. “0, you don’t know how I’ve toiled and 
slaved and sac’ificed to make you what you are. You 
don’t know what I’ve gone through!” Loudly she wailed. 
“0, you ungrateful girl!” 

“My mind is made up,” Rose whispered again, not 
moved by these wet tears. 

“You’ll never know—oo-hoo!” Mrs. Higgs wept, “what 
it is to have the child you’ve loved—oo-hoo!—turn against 
you—oo-hoo!—and want to live their own life. All I’ve 
done—oo-hoo !— ’ ’ 

“I wish I had a child of John Dawn to love,” said Rose. 
“I wish I had a brave, fierce boy-child like John Dawn.” 

Mrs. Higgs dried her tears quick as they had come. Her 
little eyes winked furiously. “You shut up!” she said 
angrily. “What’d have happened to your career with a 
baby? How’d you have earned a living for us? What’d 
have come of me? 0, more poisonous than a elephant’s 
tusk is the ingratitude of a selfish child! ’ ’ 

Rose stood firmly, showing no relenting. Her throat 
felt thick, but she would not let her mother see her cry. 
Her defiance had not lessened. After the first daring 
stand, defiance becomes easier, defiance of God or king or 
parent. 

“Let me in! You won’t? I’ll make you regret it, 
young lady!” foamed Higgs, trying to crane her neck 
through the transom. “ I ’ll tell you something ’ll make you 
sorry ! I ’ll wash my hands of you! I ’ll leave you ! I ’ll 
disown you! I’ll go to New York and marry Bellbender! 
He'll respect me. Trellbender will beat me right!” cried 


316 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Mrs. Higgs, losing her tongue. “Wart? Wart? You 
don’t care? We’ll buy rubles and casties! We’ll eat gold 
plates! We’ll bail in a sattleship that’ll make that little 
dinky Thorn look like cheese! I’ll disown you! I’ll cast 
you off!” 

“You can’t disown me, Ma,” said Rose quietly. “After 
all, I’m your daughter.” 

“You’re not! You’re not!” screeched Higgs. “Don’t 
call me Ma again. You’re nothing but the daughter of 
a traveling parson I got in Evansville, Illinoy; and I 
made Higgs think you were mine so he would marry me. 
All I have done for you! All I’ve tried to teach you 
right! All I’ve made you what you are! I’m through! 
You’re no daughter of mine!” 

Rose put her hand to her throat. “What are you say¬ 
ing ? ’ ’ 

“I’m not shraying, I’m s’ieking!’’ shrieked Mrs. Higgs. 
“Bah! Bah! Daughter of a traveling parson! Might 
know no good’d come of you ! Oo-hoo! How I’ve worked 
for you! I’ve given you everything. Oo-hoo! I mar¬ 
ried you to ten million dollars. Oo-hoo!” She stopped 
her tears. “Let me in!” she howled. “I’ll tend to you! 

I ’ll whip you till you can’t sit down ! ’ ’ 

She tried to climb through the transom. Her struggling 
heels kicked the chair from beneath her. Rose had fleet 
vision of Mrs. Higgs’s gilded curls, of her little eyes pop¬ 
ping out of her puffy cheeks, of her fat arms waving in the 
air. Something hit heavily on the hallway carpet. Some- 
thing staggered up and began to swear. Something walked 
furiously away. Mrs. Higgs was off to marry the Rever¬ 
end Doctor Bellbender. 

Rose Dawn put her head in her hands, not crying. She 
fell on her bed, lying face down, mute as a woman dead. 
For a long hour she lay, dry of eye and throat. She had 
loved her mother. 

She opened up her watch, staring at a little picture of 
John Dawn pasted in it. His dark angry eyes stared out 


WHY THOSE TEARS, LADY? 


317 


at her. His long black hair seemed to wave in winds. 
He was a man alive. 

Other lovers, yes. Other lovers many. But the first 
love, and the true love, may not he forgotten ever. 

Ah, why those tears, Rose Dawn? You did not weep 
for old Tim Grady. Your eyes were dry for Deleon. 


LXIV. NIGHT RAIN 

I N his dreams old Colonel Dawn was raving. No 
more than a husky remnant of man, dry as a sloughed 
locust shell, as a peascod, he looked in the dim-lit 
dark. Much blood had come from that old heart. His 
breast was bandaged. 

Heavy on the windows was the night rain. 

“ . . . Johnny! What mischief have you been up to 
now, boy?” 

“No, no,” murmured the sedate nurse, smoothing his 
pillow. “This is Miss Twine.” 

The old man half aroused, stirring his head. “I’m a 
nuisance,” he whispered. “All old men ... a nuisance. 
. . . Ought to shoot ’em.” 

Once more the dreams for old Dawn. And awakening 
once more. And dreams. Fitful shadows flickered in cor¬ 
ners. A fitful shadow was the old man’s life. 

“You must be brave, and fight for life,” Miss Twine 

advised. 

“ ... An old man. ... He never fought for life. . . . 
Threw it away ... a pebble. . . . Wild boy was Johnny 
. . . braver than brave. . . . Let me go. ...” 

“I remember seeing him years ago,” said Miss Twine 
brightly, fighting in her own way for old Dawn’s life. “It 
was in a picture called ‘Hearts Afire.’ ” 

“ . . . Years . . . years ago. . . . How many years has 

Hell?” 

“I’m sure I don’t know!” gasped Twine primly, 


318 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


straightening her cap. ‘ ‘ I remember him as a very daring 
actor. He rode his horse straight off a cliff. I nearly had 
a spasm, and pressed the hand of a man I didn’t know. 
But I was young and foolish then. Straight down to the 
water John Dawn dropped—” 

“I remember. . . . No other man dared do it. . . . Horse 
killed. . . . Brave. ...” 

“Many the girl who loved him,” said Miss Twine with 
a sigh. 

“He loved . . . one.” 

Old Dawn fluttered his hand, and Twine understood he 
wanted a photograph from the table beside him. She laid 
it on his breast. His hand dropped over it. Twine looked 
at the picture’s back, on which was scrawled in bold care¬ 
less letters: “For the Old Man, from John Anthony 
Dawn.” Taking it gently up, she looked at John Dawn’s 
face. He was in naval officer’s uniform. His long black 
hair was uncovered. His fierce eyes met hers steadily. 

“ . . . Never sorrowed for him. . . . The Dons . . . not 
men of tears. . . . He went. . . . That was the end . . . 
of it. . . . Brave, hard men ... the Dons. . . . Loved 
their women.” 

“I’ll bet you were brave yourself when you were 
younger, Sir. 0, I’ll bet many the exciting time you had, 
and many the girl loved you! ’ ’ 

... They’ll remember . . . Stoughton Dawn!” He 
tried to lift himself on elbows, staring at the shadows, 
listening to the rain. “Old men . . . may boast. . . . 
They knew Stoughton Dawn . . . was brave. . . . Never 
flinched. . . . Fought the fight . . . against the gates of 
Hell. ...” The old man collapsed. “Brave,” he whis¬ 
pered. “But what good was it?” 

‘‘You look much like him, Sir. The same black eyes.” 

. . . He was son to me ... in my old age. ... I 
loved ^ him! . . . Dons not men ... of tears. . . . Yet 
sometimes I . . . wish I could cry. . . . Tears don’t 
come. ...” 


NIGHT RAIN 


319 


“Tears are often best,” said Twine. “They help the 
heart.” 

Dolorously down the windows washed the night rain. 
Water dripped. No lightning flashed, but somewhere was 
groaning thunder. Heavily boomed the sea. Night crept 
on silent feet. And ever everlastingly the monotonous 
whimpering of rain. 

“I’ve forgotten what happened to him,” said Twine. 
“Such a long ’time ago. He was torpedoed on a sub¬ 
chaser, wasn’t he? It was too bad.” 

“ . . . They don’t . . . remember old wars long,” old 
Dawn whispered. “I’ve seen the fight myself. . . . I . . . 
was a soldier! . . . Carried the flag ... at Chickamauga. 

. . . You’ve heard of me . . . the boy in gray. . . . 
Drummer-boy Stoughton .Dawn . . . led the charge . . . 
once. ...” 

“Surely I’ve heard of you,” Miss Twine lied consolingly. 
“Does the world ever forget brave things?” 

Old Dawn was pitched back again into delirium. He 
cried again for the charge. He shouted exhortations to 
old ghosts. And there in the darkness, there in the night, 
there to the sorrow of the beating rain, dead men died 
again about him! 

“ . . . Down the mountains. . . . Push them down! . . . 
Who stands by me ? . . . Who ’ll go with me ? . . . Stand up! 

. . . We’re fighting yet! . . .” 

Twine began to sob. About that old man trooped the 
old dead. Silently the ranks went by, gray and gray, to 
no sound of music. Where are you, Stoughton Dawn? 
The drummer-boy is missing in those wraithy regiments. 

“. . . Down on them with the steel! . . . We’ll fight 
our way clear yet! . . . I say ... no man will stop 
us. . . . Who . . . who goes with me? . . .” 

Unto the dead that cry! Arise, you dead, and drink the 

crimson wars! 

Twine spoke softly. “That’s the way to fight! Fight 
for life now.” 


320 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Old Dawn tossed. He awoke. He whispered again for 
the picture. 

“Like that . . . when he went down. ... I’ll see him 
soon! ’ ’ 

“Don’t say that!” cried Twine piously. “I hope not! 
You must never give up.” 

“Give up . . . the ship. . . . Johnny didn’t give . . . 
it up.” 

“I’m sure he didn’t,” said Twine, settling the old man 
back on his pillow as he strove to rise. “I’m sure he 
did his duty. So many men did their duty.” 

“ . . . Sea-wasp ... off Fi$isterre. . . . That is Land’s 
End. . . .Then the deeep water!” 

“So many young men drowned.” 

• • • Drowned in the. . . . Sub got him . . . fighting 
gun for gun ... to help a sinking . . . ship. ...” 

“You mustn’t tire yourself.” Twine patted coverings 
about him. “It was very brave of him, I’m sure.” She 
wiped her eyes. “7 knew a man who died.” 

“Didn’t want to live. . . . He . . . never cared.” 
Silence, and the rain. Hoarsely beating, the bitter sea. 
“But she was famous . . . when he died. . . . Widow 
of John Dawn . . . the brave. . . . Good advertising. . . . 
Her gold curls. . . . Wrote about 'My Hero Husband.’ 

. . . She had sent . . . him out to die. . . . She wanted 
Gay . . . Deleon. . . . Did I see . . . her sitting at my 
side? . . . Johnny sat here ... for a little while. ... I 
have been dreaming.” 

She is a beautiful woman, ’ ’ said Miss Twine. ‘ ‘ Though 
blonds are fickle.” 

“Famous now, and rich. ... I know she wanted to be 
rich. . . . God . . . knows why she’s famous now. . . . 
But I know why she’s rich. ...” 

And Rose Dawn came softly through the door. She 
lifted up a black veil. Her eyes were red-rimmed. Miss 
Twine went towards her with a hand on lips. Rose knelt 


NIGHT RAIN 


821 


by the side of old Dawn’s bed, clasping his hands between 
her palms. 

Haggardly old Dawn stared at her. “Girl . . . 
girl. . . .” he muttered. 

“I had to come for his sake,” Rose whispered, touching 
his withered old hands to her soft cheek. 1 We loved him, 
you and I. We knew!” 

“ . . . You loved him! . . . You! . . . You wanted 
Deleon. . . . You . . . sent him out . . . to die. . . Girl 
. . . girl! . . . You didn’t know. . . .” 

Rose put his hands to her lips. “It was a lie!” she 
sobbed. “I’ve loved him true. Only him. Believe me! 
You know I did. If you see him—before I do, ask him. 
He knows it now ! ’ ’ 

“Girl . . . girl. . . .” 

“I love him!” 

“Yes . . . you might. ...” 

“Believe me! It was his fierce temper sent him away, 
believing a lie. A lie done by Gay and Lopez, who hated 
him because he was so proud.” Rose spoke swiftly ^and 
hysterically, not knowing if the old man listened. Be¬ 
lieve me!” 

“You are very lovely . . . girl. ... The way your eyes 
. . . shine. ...” 

Rose sobbed. Her tears were warm on his cold hands. 

“I believe you . . . girl. ... Too near the time . . . 
when all is seen ... to doubt . . . truth. ... Yet I have 
hated you . . . or tried to. . . . Forgive me. . . 

“Why, nothing to forgive,” Rose whispered. All, all 
the time’ we make mistakes. We don’t know the truth. 
So many mistakes ! And then we ’re sorry for them. Sorry 
through years and years! Will you—will you call me 
daughter?” 

“Why, yes, girl. . . . Rose . . . daughter! 

“Will you let me kiss your forehead?” 

The old man slept. He ceased to toss. A deep and 


322 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


dreamless sleep. Twine noted his pulse and temperature 
with satisfaction. Hour past hour Rose sat and held his 
hand. Tardily she arose, and drew on her black veil, and 
went out. 

“He seems to have turned the crisis,” Miss Twine whis¬ 
pered. “It needs some one to love you to make you want 
to live. I knew a man who died—” 

So the night died. Twine yawned, consulting her watch 
to mark the slow minutes till seven of the morning. 

Weary the rain. Dolorous the ocean. Eternal the 
night. With the dawn the rain died down. With the 
gray dawn, which lingered slowly. 

Twine was aware of a shadow in the room. She startled, 
for she had heard no sound. A man stood with folded 
hands. He stood silently, and silently advanced towards 
the bed. Long midnight vigils had strengthened Miss 
Twine s heart. But the man moved so softly, and the room 
was so dark, that she was afraid she, like old Dawn, be¬ 
held the dead. 

“You are some relative?” she asked. “You mustn’t 
disturb him now!” 

Black were the man’s eyes as old Dawn’s; his face thin; 
his dark hair close cropped. Miss Twine was uneasy be¬ 
neath his fierce look. 

I ye flown all night, ’ ’ he said; 11 twelve hours through 
the rain, from the Battery to here. Are you going to stop 
me?” 

He sat down, stroking old Dawn’s hand. He felt the 
slow pulse, listened to the heart. Miss Twine nodded as¬ 
surance to the silent question in his eyes. “He’s doing 
nicely.” Old Stoughton Dawn awoke. 

He whispered in a voice no louder than mist. “What’s 
this? . . . Johnny. . . 

11 No dream. It’s me. I’m here, Old Man. I’m here! ’ ’ 

“Johnny. ... I can hear you ... but I’m dreaming 
. . . Dead. . . .” 

Hush, Old Man! Feel my hand. It’s warm. I’ve 


NIGHT RAIN 


323 


come back, Old Man. Not dead—not dead, though John 
Dawn’s dead. Listen—they call me Anthony!” 

Grayer rose the morning. Rain clouds drifted clear 
from before a little sun. The world steamed with rain. 
In the gutters twittered early sparrows. 

“She —she loves you yet,” old Dawn whispered. “She 
was . . . here. ... I called her daughter. . . . She al¬ 
ways loved. ...” 

Anthony covered his eyes. “ I’ve learned, ’ ’ he said. ‘ 1 0 
God, the liar’s trick that made me go away from her! 
I’ve watched her. But I’m not worthy of her, Old Man. 
The dead are better dead. I can’t come back!” 

“Go back to her,” whispered old Dawn. 

“No!” Anthony’s jaw was set. “No! She might for¬ 
give the dead; but me— ’ ’ 

Old Dawn fell into sleep with the morning. Silently 
Anthony arose. 

“Nothing like a relative to cheer the sick,” said Twine. 
“Blood is thick—” 

“There is no blood!” said Anthony, stroking his white 
face. 

Miss Twine turned away from his dark eyes, which 
seemed to look on death. 


LXV. “GOOD-BY, MY LOVER!” 

L AURENCE SPENCER sat writing a poem. He 
wrote: “To Maveen.” Crossed it out. Wrote 
“Song of Farewell.” Crossed that out. Wrote 
“Memini Mihi,” and looked at it with pleasure. 

“ ‘Remember me.’ That will hurt her. Though I may 
have used it before.” 

Doubt came on him; the night was late, and shadowy 
with doubts. He thumbed a Latin dictionary. “Memim 
mihi —I remember me,” he read. 

Laurence crumpled the sheet and began a new one. 


324 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Memento mihi,” he wrote. So much for the title. The 
rest was easy. 

"0, to you, the all unfaithful, in the vasty darkness 
wraithful, 5 ’ he wrote. He tore that up. “0, to you, the 
all remembering, in the sunset’s fading embering,” he be¬ 
gan again. He swore decently and took a new sheet. “0, 
to you, the unforgotten, when the dawn with dew is rot¬ 
ten— ’’ 

Laurence looked at this with evil eye. “Rotten!” he 
swore. He foraged around for inspiration; but all he 
could find was two empty candy-boxes and a small half¬ 
pint of gin. “Who’s been eating my candy?” he growled. 
“Who the Hell?” He walked around, finally sitting down 
once more. He wrote— 

“Long I loved you, true and tender— 

Dead the heart which 3 7 ou have riven! 

Take back the kisses you have given, 

While I stalk away in splendor!” 

Laurence spoke this verse aloud in a crooning wail. 
Horribly he moaned. “That will make her think!” he 
said, as he wiped his wet eyes. 

Then, being angry with himself, he tore the verse to tiny 
tatters and scattered them on the rug. He began to pack 
his bag, throwing in fistsful of ties and socks, cramming 
them into the bags ’ open maws as though the bags were 
fledgling crows. 

A negro maid was humming a song outside his door. 
Only three nights before Deleon had gone out that door. 
Laurence imagined he could see Deleon’s slinking form 
shadowy in dark corners. 

Good-by, my lover . . . hum-m . . . tra-la . . . hum-m 
. . . hum-m. . . . Good-by, my lover.” 

Sweet that mellow negro tune, wordless and droning. A 
knock, and the black maid put her shining face inside the 
door. “Lady, ’m, say she lak see you, Mist Spenca, ’m.” 


'‘GOOD-BY MY LOVER!” 


325 


“I’m packing,” said Laurence crossly. “Tell her I’m 
packing.” 

The holy smoke closed the door. Down the corridor, 
drifting faint, died her song. “ . . . Hum-m . . . tra-la 
. . . hum-m . . . Good-by, my lover; good-by. ...” 

Dark rain lowered without. Thick landward clouds were 
pouring up from ocean. Thirteen days of rain, said all 
wise old men. Thirteen days of rain, and storm at sea. 
Let the hurricane flags be lifted in the Caribbees! Let the 
great tornadoes gather! Let the sailors’ women weep. 

Maveen Grady was waiting in the lobby below. Singing 
low, the maid came down to her. ‘ ‘ What did Mr. Spencer 
say, Jezebel?” 

“He doan say nuffin,” explained the dark lady. 
“Hum-m . . . tra-la. ...” 

“Stop that whine! Did you tell him I wanted to see 
him ?” 

“No, ’m. I say lady, ’m, lak see him. Ain’t got no 
time fo’ ladies, he say.” 

“Tell him Miss Grady wants to see him. Tell him I’m 
sorry—” She broke off, walking up and down. “No, 
don’t tell him that. Tell him I’ll see him.” 

“Yes, ’m. I’ll tell ’im, ’m, you-all lak see ’im . . . 
Good-by, my lover . . . hum-m . . . tra-la. . . . He busy, 
and he ain’t got no time fo’ trifling. . . . Good-by. . . .” 

“Stop that crazy song!” screamed Maveen. “You’ll 
drive me out of my wits! ’ ’ 

“Yes, ’m,” said Jezebel. “Yes, ’m, I’m going, ’m. 
Doan hit me, ’m. . . . Tra-la, tra-la. . . . Good-by, my 
lover. ...” 

She approached Laurence’s door again. “Lady, ’m, still 
want to see you-all, ’m. She prowling aroun down-stai s. 
She Mrs. Grady.” 

“Mrs. Grady?” asked Laurence, feeling his heart 
tremble. 

“Yes, ’m. One with green dress and red hai’.” 


326 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Tell her I’m in a hurry to catch my train.” 

“Yes, ’m. She say she bust ma head if you doan come 
down, ’m.” 

Laurence continued viciously to cram his bags. Jezebel 
slumped away, not caring much if her head should be 
busted or not. Singing, far away, dying: “Hum-m . . . 
Good-by, my lover: good-by!” 

Fat rain spattered. The ocean in fierce fear thundered 
at the shore. With that one stounding surge it subsided 
again to its low crooning. 

Maveen walked up and down the common-room of the 
Poinsettia. Lights went out. She walked up and down. 
The night-clerk yawned at her, not silently, but with tears. 
She walked up and down. Rain poured. Bong! went a 
clock. Maveen wanted to tear something to pieces; per¬ 
haps more, she wanted a drink. 

“Telephone Mr. Thornwood Clay’s room,” she told the 
clerk. “No, I don’t want to speak to him myself. It’s 
nothing important. Just tell him I’m willing now to 
marry him. That’s all.” 

The clerk yawned off the message. “Hum-m . . . tra- 
la. . . .” sang Jezebel. 

Laurence had continued his packing with a shrug. Much 
may be lifted from shoulders with a gesture when one is 
twenty-eight. Other girls were in the world, even other 
red-haired girls. Laurence wondered if he cared for red 
hair. How about golden curls? How about the dark 
ringlets of little Bunnie Hoag? 

What was love? What was a woman? Didn’t an 
amoeba experience love’s passion when it split and wiggled 
joyously away as two amoebas? What was woman more 
than the female of the species Homo erectus sapiensque 
loquaxque? What was woman more than woman? What 
was love more than Love? 

A woman was an anthropoid, like the monkeys. (Lau¬ 
rence thought of Arethusa.) A mammal, like the whales. 
(He thought of Mrs. Higgs.) A vertebrate, like the fishes. 


'‘GOOD-BY MY LOVER r 


327 


(He thought of Mrs. Mallow.) The great angels ringing 
Heaven’s fire might be zoologically lower, having six ap¬ 
pendages like the insects, but no one wants to marry an 
angel. Laurence settled on this conclusion: Woman was 
only one step above the Simiidae, the ape, the gorilla, the 
chimpanzee, and the dog-faced baboon. 

He remembered little Bunnie Hoag, who had run away 
without one word of farewell. Laurence was suspicious 
she had run away with a bell-hop who had disappeared 
about the same time. Yet she had pretended she loved 
him. She had left a Harvard man, the grandson of a 
Sears, for a wop with a pimple on his nose. Laurence felt 
his eyes moist for shame and for her dear dark curls 
now lost. 

On hands and knees he gleaned the floor, striving to 
gather again that verse he had torn up. Vain. He sat 
down and wrote another verse, reading it when it was fin¬ 
ished in mournful monotone, letting his tears roll— 

“You have left me eating the husks and the ashes, 

Drunk with the salt of the bitterest lees. 

And now for another your gayety flashes; 

You take his embraces, you sit on his knees. 

Your little heel cares not the hearts which it mashes.” 

Laurence intended to write a sixth line, but the only 
rhymes of which he could think were “freeze,” “cheese,” 
and “fleas.” He entitled this little heart-throbber “To 
Bunnie, the False.” He tried to resume his biological 
thoughts. What is love? What is a woman? Woman is 
but—the universe. Knowledge comes, but love lingers. 
So it does at twenty-eight. 

Laurence was nearly done with packing. He slammed 
open his closet door, which had been closed for days. As 
he stumbled about inside, his foot kicked something soft. 
There lay Bunnie in her little red dress, asleep on the 
floor. 

He touched his hand to her forehead. He picked her 


328 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


up in his strong arms and swung her high, her dark curls 
falling on his shoulder. Her eyes slowly opened. Still 
Laurence thought he was seeing visions: 

“I ran away,” she whispered. “Mamma was going to 
punish me. I’m hungry.” 

“You’ve been hiding in that closet over three days?” 
Laurence gasped. 

“Don’t know how long,” she nodded sleepily. 
“Couldn’t find anything to eat except candy. What have 
you got to eat, Larry? I could devour stacks of fried 
eggs. It was exciting at first to hear mamma crying in the 
next room. I was afraid she’d feel bad. Some man came 
into your room late last night and started to open the 
closet door, but he ran out the window. I haven’t dared 
to come out. 0, I’m starved! I wish I had some chicken 
a la Maryland.” 

“I’ll have to give you back to your mother, Bunnie,” 
Laurence whispered, nuzzling her scented hair. 

Don t you dare ! ’ ’ She kicked a sleepy foot against his 
thigh. She 11 spank me to death. You’ve got to take 
me away with you, and we’ll be married.” 

“And live happily ever after, Bunnie!” whispered Lau¬ 
rence, holding her close. He felt solemn and awful; and 
he had a vision of dozens of little dark-curled children 
i unning about the floor. For Laurence was a gynaecolo¬ 
gist. “You’ll be my wife!” 

Yes. I wish I had some mulligatawny, Larry. I wish 
I had some soup.” 

He seated her on his knees. “I’ve got something to 
read you,” he said softly. “It’s called—To Bunnie.’ 
It’s a poem.” 

After a while,” she said. “But now you must get me a 
great big enormous dinner from shrimp cocktail to cheese. 
And bushels and bushels of steak with mushrooms!” She 
clapped her hands imperiously. ‘ ‘ Hurry! ’ ’ 

Laurence was delighted. It pleased him to be ordered 
around by women. He pressed her close. 


DEEP TIDES DROWN 


329 


LXVI. DEEP TIDES DROWN 

O NE night of weltering stars had come in those 
thirteen days of hurricane. The ocean was 
thick as cold oil. No surge ran on it. 

McGinty drove Anthony down beside the ocean. “Look 
ye, Mister-r Anthony! Did man iver see the like?” 

Green fire coiled in the ocean depths. Slow ripples 
turned with light fair as the moon. Roller climbing 
heavily on roller shook out sparkles of emeralds. More 
than light of moon or of the doubtful stars, that cold green 
fire. 

Wanly writhed the phosphorescence of the ocean, of the 
Noctiluca, flames of night. More numerous their infinitesi¬ 
mal bodies than seconds in eternity. Some mystic delight 
ravished their spirits to thin luminous flames. Their joy 
consumed the utter ocean. Heavily rolled the ocean, flak¬ 
ing to absinthe wine. 

“Out beyont,” said McGinty, casting his arm afar, “on 
Malimus Isle bides Gr’asy Pate, who struck the stroke at 
Colonel Dawn; and who ye’re looking far-r far-r other 
reasons, I’m a-thinking, Mister-r Anthony. I till ye that 
because ye’re fri’nd o’ mine. Do what ye will with it.” 
“He’s got away, McGinty?” 

i 1 If Pate’s got away, ’tis to there he’s got. He has been 
a-biding his time, and now he’s chased from off the Thorn. 
He has no place to turn! Ay, to there, to Malimus. We 
had it plotted—Gay, Pate, and me. ’Tis an isle of Hell, 
is Malimus! It belongs to auld King Garge; may divils 
rot him! ’Tis far-rty mile away by sea, or more or less. 
But there can ye git the liquor.” 

On the strand beside the glittering emerald ocean a 
group of night bathers had built a high bonfire. Huge 
flotsam logs of driftwood burned in mighty holocaust. 
They laughed with roaring shouts for the tickling of the 
fire. Sparks rocketed up from them. The great logs 


330 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


hissed as flame ate their gnarled hearts. They twisted tor¬ 
tuously, and cracked in thousand. In glorious embers 
they fell to dissolution. 

Ah, snarled Dinnis McGinty, halting his car and look¬ 
ing long at those dim red figures moving about the great 
bonfire. Tis the Gradys. There is he, that r-roaring 
rid-hid Paddy, image of auld Tim Grady. And there’s 
the girl, and Mister-r Clay. ’Tis said they’re being mar¬ 
ried. But who is that? And who is that who’s walking 
out to sea? ’Tis Rose Dawn going out into the ocean!” 

Three figures about the flawing fire, shielding their faces 
from the smoke. Wet bathing suits clung closely to Pa- 
driac and Clay. Padriac kicked a log into the fire’s heart. 
Crimson shone his arms and face, diabolical and giant- 
strong. Once he looked up across the fire at the car where 

Anthony sat. His gray eyes were green as a cat’s, shining 
with the ocean. 

Rose was treading the sand, and now the inshore ripples. 
She stepped more deeply into slumberous green waters. 
She hesitated, dabbling her feet. It seemed presentiment 
of near disaster came to her heart. Yet the waters were 
lovely and bright. The waters were gleaming and warm. 

Watching her, Anthony grew afraid, grew sick with dis¬ 
mal foreboding. No fear had he ever known before, not of 
himself and death. But Rose Dawn moved with such cold 
purpose; and there was something fatal in her manner. 

I m going out! she cried. 1 i T rn going out!” 

And it was as though she meant her bright light would 
go out. ^ Who would go with her there ? Ripples shook 
with quivering lights as she waded farther in. She was a 
goddess of the sea in those uneartnly waters, w r alking in 
her element. No cold sea beast would dare to harm her 
no waters smother and drown. 

Her white arms lay extended over the ocean. A bub¬ 
bling lane of fire trailed after her. Softly lapping, softly 
Lipping, a comber kissed her breast, cascading it with 
jewels. Far and far into the night, into the cruel ocean. 


DEEP TIDES DROWN 


831 


Anthony heard a land bell begin to toll, as toll sea-dirges. 

Breast to breast she met the sea. Pausingly she struck 
the tide with glistening arms. It was a vision of a dream; 
no life lived in this heavy world. No one could die. In 
another world she drifted away. Lowly thunder clapped. 
The hushed bell ringing, ringing, brought back mutterings 
from the hanging clouds. And now Rose Dawn was deep 
out. Far and far into the night, into the cruel ocean. 

Faint came her voice beyond the veils of night, 
“ . . . Deep water. . . 

Far and far into the night, unea'ger for the shore, she 
slowly passed. Old ocean wrapped her in clear billows. 
Her head was but a little flame which failed and died away 
out on the horizons. 

The grassy fires of the sea grew dim. The stars were 
overcast; yes, many a star was overset. Swift as a cur¬ 
tain fell the blackness. The ocean was invisible, and black 
and round the world. 

“ ’Tis not Din McGinty would like to go that way. The 
auld sea is deep!” 

That way for you alone, Rose Dawn, out in the drowning 
sea ? 

The land bell rung its dirge. “Gone!—Gone!—Gone!” 

Far from the hidden waters came one cry. 

Anthony leaped. Sands clotted his feet; he tripped over 
grass and flotsam and weed; the hard white shore beach 
was beneath his feet. He tore off coat and shoes, and 
threw himself into the black water. 

Padriac was already beating out ahead of him, thick 
with drink, but strong and sure. Again came Rose Dawn’s 
faint cry over the desolate wastes of ocean. It drove both 
men to fury. Anthony heard Grady’s great gasping 
breath. 

Cold waves passed over Anthony. He threshed on, 
sucking wind at the fourth stroke. He knew these seas, 
these tides, these drownings. These were salt of his blood, 
these tropic seas. Half clothed, he overtook Padriac, who 


332 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


swam with head too high. Their beating hands touched. 
Stroke for stroke they whipped the sea. 

Anthony drew ahead, stroke for stroke. He pulled at 
the waters furiously. He tried to skim along them. 0, 
leaden arms and feet! 

No cry now at all. An eddy bubbled in the deep ahead 
of him. Sucking air, Anthony dived far down. Down, 
down in the restless strangling black he caught hold of a 
woman’s hair, tangled like weeds. Upward with bursting 
heart he thrust for the precious air and the dark light of 
night. 

Sobbing for breath, he trod waters. Rose Dawn’s eyes 
were closed as if on everlasting dreams. Her dear gold 
curls trailed over her forehead. Up and down with drag¬ 
ging feet her body rocked in the slow ocean stir, her head 
lying on Anthony’s arm. The sullen ocean, blackly wash¬ 
ing over her breast, was more sensate than she. 

11 Gone!—Gone!—Gone! ’ ’ the dirge bell rang. 

Suddenly the under tides sucked at the swimmer. The 
ocean was shaken with thunder. Anthony clung to his 
love in the drowning tides, fighting back with insane fury 
the strength of the vast deep. He held her head upon his 
arm and fought towards the shore. Salt was in his eyes 
and on his lips, but it was not salt of the sea. 

Near shore Padriac swam up to him, sputtering: “Let 
me have her!”—“Away!” gasped Anthony. Grady 
struck at him, striving to pull the girl away. They passed 
blows in the water. Padriac went down in a swirl. In 
his arms, lifting her high, Anthony brought her up the 
shore. 

For an hour giant logs crackled. Their cinders dulled. 
Down roared cataclysmic rain. The world was drowned. 
Thunder muttered. Far from the town beyond Bay Mi- 
mayne church bells were clamoring: “Gone!—Gone!” 
Anthony raved at them. For an hour he fought for Rose 
Dawn’s life. 

The sea had loved her tenderly, and death had loved her 


DEEP TIDES DROWN 


333 


tenderly. Had loved her eyes, which were the tropics. 
Had loved her beautiful body. They were loth, the sea 
and death, to let her go. 

“Get back,” said Anthony to those around, for he saw 
her eyes were stirring. 

“What are you telling me?” asked Padriac hoarsely, 
giving Anthony’s knees a buffet. “Who are you, giving 
orders to a Grady? I’ll take no word from you!” 

“Get back!” said Anthony, with a flash of his eyes. 

Clay held Maveen beneath the shelter of his arm while 
the storm poured. She whimpered like a puppy. Mc- 
Ginty had fashioned himself a shelter of palm-fronds, and 
in his den he cursed and spat and growled at the great 
ocean. With threatening arms Padriac paced up and down 
the shore, damning the hurricane. 

Anthony called to the girl who slept so stilly. And 
again he called. She made no answer. But her heart was 
stirring. Blood was in her sea-cold cheeks. 

He whispered. “Rose! ... If you ever loved me, Rose- 
girl, remember now! It’s Johnny here with you! . . . 
I’ve got my arms about you! Don’t you know my voice, 
dear little love?” 

Her eyes opened faintly, and she seemed to know him. 
Some word she whispered. Her arms tried to tighten. 
But she lay cold within his embrace again. 

11 Forgive me, Rose-girl! Forgive me, crimson Rose ! ’ ’ 

Her hair was in Anthony’s nostrils. His fingers felt 
their way up and down her cold smooth arms. The pulsing 
of her heart was stronger. Anthony knew the fight was 
won. He had stolen her from the sea. 

Surges rose upon the stormy ocean. Winds growled 
and blew loud; they screamed. The rain was heavy with 
tornadoes. Lightning streaking down the sea showed one 
ship far out, laboring ill. Rockets went up from her, dull 
scarlet stars fading soon. The loud winds whistled with 
high laughter. 

The last ember of the fire was drowned. Nothing left 


334 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


of the giant merry logs but little crisps of ash, sodden in 
the sand. Chips of charred wood. 

“So die the old loves,” thought Anthony. “So all the 
old loves perish. Better had I stayed dead! Better—” 

The church bells rang from town, across the bay, be¬ 
yond the curtain of the rain. “Come!—Come to death!” 
they rang. “Come!—Come!” 

Anthony lifted his dark eyes and understood that sound. 

He wrapped his coat about Rose Dawn and laid her softly 
in the sand. “Take care of her,” he whispered to Maveen. 
“Watch out for her well. I put her in your trust. Don’t 
let her think too unkindly of me if—something happens.” 

He spoke to McGinty and went away in the rain. 

“Come!—Come to death!—Come!—Come!” 


LXVII. THE BLACK KING 

B ELLS ringing in dismal midnight. Church bells 
clamoring as the storm comes down. Bells ring¬ 
ing for the hurricane, swaying, mournful, crazed 
with sound. 

Black clouds from out the night of ocean. The rain 
which beats upon the shore has not yet reached the bay and 
town. Air is thick and choking. No wind blows. Over 
the sea hang fringes of a still tornado. The waves froth, 
the waves toss, the waves billow high. Frantically they 
throw aloft their arms as they run northward. Old ocean 
beats his breast. Yet no wind at all is risen. The air is 
still. Heavily hangs the hushed tornado. 

The dreadful blow hangs suspended. Clouds’ iron 
doors, riven by lightning, hold back the hurricane. Yet 
old ocean beats his breast, fearing scorpion whips, the old 
remembered knouts. Whimpering rises the cry of old 
ocean, an ululation of many waters. 

The bells! Continually swing their sad hammers. 
They moan to the dull thunder, monotonous, full of dolor. 


THE BLACK KITSTG 


335 


To no holy hour of prayer they call. Drowning bells! 
They ring in midnight’s dreadful doom! 

Hushed murmurings rise in midnight beneath that 
clangor of bells. Vague, muttering as the ocean, sounds 
the low murmur of many men torn out of sleep. Inop- 
pugnable as hurricane, formless as chaos, the gathering 
mob! The mob which swells at midnight. Hear its mur¬ 
muring mingling with the bells! 

“Good thing old Colonel Dawn is on his bed,” says X, 
trotting down the road. 

Says Y, tucking his night-shirt tails into his pants: 
“Good thing. You said it, X. Old Colonel’s dreadful 
man to go against, and he’s stern set on law. Hi-hi! Hi- 
hi! Hi-hi!” 

“God help ’im now,” says Z. “Say, I was sound 
asleep. Ain’t this a hour?” 

Stars blaze hazily in the west. No stars at all in the 
east. On midnight streets men walk aimlessly up and 
down, and swirl in knots, and whisper together. Sweat is 
on their foreheads. No man looks straightforward. Their 
shaking fingers point southward to the cypress swamps. 

Van Chuch and Todd are up and on the streets. They 
walk about, oppressed by the dreadful murmurings. The 
air they breathe is lourd. Heavily lies the eastern hurri¬ 
cane. Mutters the ocean. Toll the bells. 

“What the devil is happening, Todd?” 

“Don’t ask me, van Chuch. Don’t ask me.” 

Shadows of midnight stretch out lean claws. The eyes 
of the darkness are bitter, its countenances foul as reptiles. 
Far away from the cypress swamps sounds one stilled 
scream, inchoate, terrible in its pain. 

A rat of a man runs out of an alleyway, slinking, skulk¬ 
ing, the dirtiest shadow of the dirty night. Rat he is, or 
snake; or perhaps (as he calls himself) coyote. His breath 
foams. His eyes burn fiercely. He has vanished out on 
the swamp road. In his quick right hand is something 
sharp, the heavy serpent knife! 


336 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“Stop Mm! Get Mm! That was Lopez, as I’m a liv¬ 
ing man! Where was he hiding? Where’s he gone? 
What’s he doing now?” 

“We’ll get him yet,” says Todd. “I have a thing or 
two I want to pay him back. 0, damn those howling 
bells! You might think that God were dead.” 

“What’s happening, Todd? Why are they running?” 

“I don’t know, van Chuch. But I say to you, van 
Chuch, that I don’t like it.—Hey, you, stop a minute! 
What’s the excitement? Where are you running?” 

Men go past on steady, doglike feet. Many carry guns, 
pistols; some have lengths of rope, ship-ropes, packing- 
ropes, clothes-lines. They gasp. Small boys follow the 
men, shrieking and laugMng to each other. The little son 
of X wears only a nightshirt and a woolen cap. Every one 
takes the road to the cypress swamps. Under tunnels of 
trees they disappear, going the way that Pete Lopez has 
run. The air is vibrant long with their hoarse breathing. 

“Let’s follow ’em, Todd!” 

“Say; say, let’s tell old Dawn of this. He ought to 
know what’s up.” 

Now the bells swinging, swinging, gaining rhythm, gain¬ 
ing passion. Other bells, far beyond the reaches of the 
outmost winds, take up that rolling song. Insane their 
tongues, a chant of madness, a horrible song in the ghostly 
hour when the hid sun sweeps past the nadir. It will 
echo down to Hell, the music of those brass church bells! 
Hark to their cry! 

“They’ve got the nigger Tom! Run — run—run , all you 
men! Come — come — come! They’ve got black Tom!” 

Fear walks the deep. A night-giant wave breaks on the 
hidden shores. Creation trembles with a groaning. 
Dully the thunder rumbles. Rain has struck beyond the 
bay on Key Mimayne. Lightning shows a ship far out, 
laboring ill. Rockets go up from her, dull scarlet 
stars. . . . 

Rifles bark, sharp as dogs; not with the brave laughter 


THE BLACK KING 


337 


of a volley, but yelpingly, fired by cowardly hands which 
lie in ambush, bickering from the dark. 

“They’ve caught black Tom!” 

Cook has left his kitchen, and loafer his lamp-post. 
Barber has dropped his shears, soda-sizzler his shaker, 
teamster his reins, lawyer his books. Bridegroom has left 
his sweet young bride, old man his old wife. Priest and 
pander, blackguard, banker, bum, bootlegger—they run 
towards the cypress swamps. Cars sweep with a roar on 
the night roads, swift streaking cars, little wheezing cars, 
slow elephant trucks picking up running men. Men wipe 
their lips as they hurry, for like slaver on them is that salt 
fierce taste. 

Hoarsely clamor bells. Hell hears. The hidden hurri¬ 
cane threatens the day of doom. 

Farmers in lonely dwellings hear those tocsins ringing, 
and leap from bed. Fishermen leave their huts beside the 
dark sea. Menials in respectful black hur^y half-clad 
from the gardened palaces of the exclusive rich. Ocean 
captains leave their cabins. From far as bells can ring 
men are gathering. 

“Come — come — come! They’ve caught black Tom, who 
ripped the soul from Deleon!” 

Bear up the fiery cross, and wave it as a banner! 
Fierce hurricanes of death, unleash your ravening whelps! 
Spew up, old ocean, dead men’s bones! 

“Come- — come — come! They’ve caught black Tom, who 
did to death Tim Grady!” 

Hark to the roar! The air is drowned! 

“Come — come — come! They’ve caught black Tom, who 
put his hands on beautifid Rose Dawn!” 

0 whimpering seas! 0 hurricanes ! 

“Come — come — come! They’ve caught black Tom, who 
wronged your maiden Arethusa!” 

Guns flash as spears. The clappers of the bells are 
growing hot. 

“Come — come — come! They’ve caught black Tom, who 


338 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


slew two of your posse men , and shot Boosten Claude 
through the heart!” 

Clap shut your eyes. Stifle your heart. 

Out of the cypress swamps, out of the fastnesses of the 
black king, boils the tumultuous mob. It rolls along a 
great gory dragon, foam in its jaws. 

And what is this giant which stumbles along, falling, 
kicked up, hauled up from the mud and dust? What is 
this thing which looks like man? What do the boots kick? 
M hat feels the crashing cudgels ? What is this stricken by 
the smudgy tossing torches? Whose wrists are strangled 

deep with barbed fence wire? What is this thing which 
groans ? 

Black Tom! 0 son of the great kings! 0 warrior of 

the hosts of spears! 0 leader of the lances in the jungle! 

0 Ethiopia, Thinite gods! 0 fierce and mighty heart! 

Hoarse roars the clamoring cry. Brazenly beat the 
bells. They are one, those dreadful thunders, the solemn 
sound of death. 

0 learned man! 0 gentleman! If you knew more, you 

would know less. If you knew less, you would know 
more, black Tom, king of men. Black Tom! Tom Jeffer¬ 
son, M.D.! Doctor Thomas Jefferson! 

Dancing along at the head of the mob, like the lipping 
tongue of.the dragon, who is this fierce frenetic man? 
Who is this shouter ? Who slashes air with steel ? Who 
pants with crazy laughter? 

Pete Lopez, Greasy Pete, seer of the stars! He leaps on 
high, and swirls and dances, for seven devils out of Hell 
burn in his crazy heart. 

Death—death—death to the dog! 

^ “Got a rope?'’—“Take that, you smoky gorilla!”_ 

“Out o’ the way, sonny. ’S ain't no place for little 
shavers.’’—“Where’s old Colonel Dawn?”—“We’ll tend 
to him if he butts in!”—“God! Let me at him! God!” 

High above all an old man’s shrill senile cackles, the 
voice of a small boy consumed with giggles. 


THE BLACK KING 


339 


“Easy, boys! He won’t last.”—“His eyes is closin’ al¬ 
ready. Give ’im air!”—“Whose party is this, anyhow? 
Hell! ’ ’—‘ ‘ Get away, buddy, I tell you! ’ ’—‘ ‘ In the name 
of the crucified thieves!”—“Name o’ Jesus—” 

Spike and Stubb, strong and stern, stand in the road 
against the terrible mob. Their broad shoulders are set. 
They raise aloft their arms. “Stand back!”—“Hand 
over your prisoner!”—“To the law!”—“In the name of 
Colonel Dawn ! ’ ’ 

Men swirl about them. Spike goes down, and comes up 
with bloody head, battling ten men at once. Stubb hits 
about him blindly, with two men riding on his great broad 
shoulders. 

“Break away!”—“Surrender your man to the law!”— 
“We warn you!”—“In the name of Colonel Dawn!” 

“To Hell with all your Dawns! We got this nigger 
now! ’ ’ 

The dragon rolls to the side, overflowing on a muddy 
field. It smashes down a wire fence. It sops in muck. 
It sprawls, stumbles, rolls over a ditch. With panting 
tongues it gathers towards a lean burnt pine. 

Pete Lopez jerks off coiling strands of barbed wire from 
the fence. Men gather firewood, draff and stubble, piling 
it about the lean burnt pine. A dreadful pyre. And now 
men brace their feet and haul the barbed coils steadily, 
round and round the pine and the dying giant. 

The wood begins to crackle. Flames twist. 

“God be merciful!” screams X. “I can’t watch it!” 

He takes sure aim, and shoots. 

Compassionless, and altogether beasts. Not altogether, 
for other rifles rattle from the dark. 

And now with a loud cry van Chuch and Todd are stag¬ 
gering over the muck, supporting old Colonel Dawn be¬ 
tween them! The fury of the old man’s eyes burns hot¬ 
ter than the fire. 

Van Chuch is fighting right and left with fists. He 
strikes out with roaring ocean curses. The blood of war 


840 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


is in him, Berserker rage of the brave lords of the sea. 
Y rushes up to meet him. Y is a simple grocer, thick of 
thought and speech; but now turned to a red beast. Van 
Chuch’s fist catches Y at the chin, and he crashes back 
into the crackling fire. 

. And Todd has lifted up a fence rail, and he clears a 
circle about him. He grows young again, and shouts a 
college football cheer. “Hold ’em— Hold ’em, Michigan! 
Get back! What are you doing to the law? The law!” 
He swings his great fence rail till his bald head is all 
asweat. 

And Spike and Stubb have out their billies, and they 
knock men aside. Spike hurls himself on Z, who falls be¬ 
fore he’s hit, bellowing like a slaughtered cow. 

“You swine! You bestial cattle! 0 you red dogs of 
Hell! ’ ’ 

Old Dawn’s finger points to man past man. His ter¬ 
rible glances consume them. He shakes with soundless 
fury. The madness of the Dawns, the anger of the men 
who do not forget! The dragon melts, and falls in shards. 
Men stumble and crawl and fall away. They drop their 
rifles in the stubble. They hurl their torches far away, 
crimson arcs against the storm. 

Greasy Pete Lopez, running hard with fear, lets loose a 
frenetic cry. For Anthony is coming, leaping towards 
the breaking mob. Eyes of the dead! Eyes of dead John 
Dawn! Has the hurricane released him ? Has the ocean 
let him go? 

Wet with the rain and the sea, fierce Anthony stands by 
old Dawn. His arm goes about the old man’s shoulders. 
The dragon has become a thousand worms, slinking away, 
crawling away into the merciful therk. A sob arises, 
hoarse as the sobbing ocean. 

“You thought the Dawns were dead!” 

The bells are silenced. 

Out of the night clouds smash down the first hot bullets 
of the rain. 


THE BLACK KING 


341 


“Let us pray/’ whispers an old, old man. 

They jerk off their hats, kneel down, and pray as the 
rain crashes. 

But you, black Tom, king of men, hear not their mur¬ 
muring voices. For you the voice of Death, which is the 
Black King. For you the voice of Immortality, which is 
the White King. For you the voice of your dreadful God, 
who .is the King of Kings! 

LXVIII. NEW MOON 

B LACK dawn stirs. The rain grows faint. Cloud 
cannot be marked from cloud, for all the world is 
a pall of mist more terrible than darkness. 

Down on the Thorn’s wet decks men creep again in 
search of the hunted. They stir like shadows in the dismal 
murk. Their feline feet are soft with doom. Seven men 
once again in search of the hunted. They watch warily. 
Their hearts tremble. They hold fast to guns in their 
pockets. 

Beware, Anthony! Beware, John Dawn! You do not 
hear their silent approach. But the mast of the Thorn 
casts reflection on the waters like a gallows. 

Ike Duval goes first of all those men. His stone jowls 
crunch; his eyes are narrowed. After him follows Padriac 
Grady, muttering and a little drunk. Van Chuch is 
hushed and stern, somewhat saddened, somewhat morose. 
Todd has set his teeth as brass, and his great bald head 
shines inhumanly. Arsen is there, and Spike and Stubb. 
Right and left fists of the law are they, and they know 
how to smite. Manacles dangle in their pockets. 

Through all her sharp length the Thorn is rumbling. 
Her heart sings for the ocean. Pale smoke flaws from her 
stack. Her bow is pointed down surging Black River. 
Half an hour more— 

Too late, Anthony! Too late! The cruel dogs are on 
you! 


342 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


They did not find him in the engine room, nor in the 
white-and-gold cabin. Cunningly they opened all doors, 
watching for sudden shots. They fell on him at last, see¬ 
ing him by a red lightning flash, in that place where he 
would be least expected, old Tim Grady’s cabin. 

Ike Duval burst in the door and caught Anthony by 
surprise before he had time to lower hand to pocket. 
Gun level, Ike Duval advanced. He felt over Anthony’s 
pockets. He thrust the muzzle of his gun against An¬ 
thony’s heart. 

Anthony Anthony, you are arrested for the murder 
of Timothy Grady!” 

Anthony said nothing. 

“Get McGinty, boys!” roared Ike. “He’s down in the 
engine room. I’ll handle Mr. Anthony. You, Anthony— 
don’t laugh at met I’ve got you dead. You came to 
Biscayne in disguise on the day Tim Grady was murdered. 
You stayed to kill him. And in the morning you went 
away. I’ve traced you, Anthony! I’ve traced your every 
step. Step up, Stubb! Put the irons on him!” 
t “Anthony! Tony! Why did you do it?” cried Arsen. 
“I always thought you were one of my friends.” He 
shook his head and pulled his brown mustaches. 

River waves threshed against the Thorn's plates with a 
frothy wash. 

“I came here,” said Anthony slowly. “I had to see 
Rose Dawn! Something you told me in New York once 
Ike, made me learn the dirty trick Pete Lopez had played 
on me. I had to see Rose Dawn! But when I got here 
I couldn’t speak to her. I went away again.” 

“But you stayed to kill Tim Grady, Anthony!” said Ike, 
thrusting his heavy face into Anthony’s. “If not you’ 
then Rose Dawn—” 

“I’ll kill the man who says a word against Rose Dawn! 
Stand back! I’ll kill him with my hands!” 

No one said anything against Rose Dawn. 

“/ never said anything,” muttered Arsen. “Mac- 


NEW MOON 


343 


Ercher and Wiggs and the whole world might lie about 
her. But I’d never believe it.” 

Padriac Grady stumbled around with steps which were 
like Tim Grady’s heavy ghost. “You seem to be pretty 
damned intimate with her,” he growled. “Who are you, 
anyway ?’ ’ 

“Put the irons on him, Stubb!” 

They were wary. They were afraid of him, for he was 
a desperate man, and they knew he would stop at nothing. 
They were pressed for breath. The little cabin where Tim 
Grady had died was dark. 

Sheet lightning flashed red, fearfully carmining 
Anthony’s face. Storm beat on the roof, washing heavily 
down the decks. The Thorn rocked, mad with fear of 
great hurricanes which struck the outer ocean. Again 
lightning flashed red. 

“Something more important than Tim Grady for me 
now,” said Anthony. “I’m going to get Pete Lopez! 
You think I killed the old man?—He killed himself!” 

Higgleson Todd looked curiously at Anthony; he was 
shrewd, and accustomed to tearing the truth from lying 
witnesses. Again lightning. Arsen shivered. Padriac 
Grady breathed heavily. It was an ominous sound in 

that room where Grady died. 

“What are you trying to say, Anthony?” asked Todd. 

“Tim Grady was terrified that night,” said Anthony. 
‘ i Something happened to him at the last, making him 
more afraid, making him hate Bose Dawn. He tumbled 
back into his cabin, onto that bed there, and reached for 
the will drawn by Wiggs. As he signed it, and put out 
his light—it’s clear enough now, if you look—his hand or 
his head knocked down from that shelf right above him his 
books, and his papers, and his diary. And down came 
that weighted knife! It’s plain enough.” 

Spike and Stubb nodded as solemnly as elephants. 
“I’d always suspected something like that,” said Stubb. 
“Had killed him,” finished Spike, bound to say his say. 


344 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


“It seems reasonable/' said van ’Chuch at last. “I've 
handled that knife once or twice, and I remember how 
overbalanced its blade was." 

“Could it fall hard enough without a hand?" asked 
Todd, his eyes narrow. 

It was sharp, said Anthony. “It fell hard enough." 

Spike and Stubb wrapped their coats about their ears, 
and went out into the rain. Todd wiped his head, nodding 
slowly. Padriac Grady leaned against the post of the 
cabin door, sullenly scowling. Anthony called through the 

little porthole to Arsen, who was slumping away down the 
deck. 


“No hard feelings, Wig. Here’s my hand." 

Anthony tried to put his hand through the porthole, 
but it could not open wide enough. Todd noted that. 
No hand could have gone through there, not even Pete 

Lopez’s womanish hand, not even the slender hand of 
Rose Dawn. 


Below decks the ungeared engines rumbled. 

„ “ You did me a g° od turn once, Ike," said Anthony, 
when you told me about Pete Lopez. Are you my man ? ’ ’ 

I am, Sir! Yes, Sir!" Ike touched his derby. “I’m 

going out, if you’re going out, Mr. Anthony to get that 
Pete Lopez." 

Padriac was last to leave. His eyes were wrathy- he 
clenched his fingers. “Who are you?" he asked with a 
trace of fear. “How do you get the right to take out my 
ship? What hold have you on Rose? You seem to own 
the earth, and all that’s in it!" He walked down the 
p ank; ion the dock he turned. “I’ve a good mind to stop 
you he threatened unconvincingly. “You butt in where 
you haven t any business. Who in God’s name are you! ’ ’ 
Mad tornadoes sweeping up from ocean! And the Thorn 

stands ready for the sea. Bravely shine her lights. But 
the sea is black. 

. "Thundering surges crush the coral shores. Black River 
is a froth and foam, palms bending on its banks. All of 


NEW MOON 


345 


shallow Bay Mimayne is turned to the sky. Her floors 
are swept clean. The deepest fish are bruised and beaten. 

Hurricane! Pray for the dead. 

Over the coral keys sweep billows, roar on roar, blow on 
blow, combers unendingly, tottering the universe. Key 
Mimayne, shutting off bay from ocean, is drowned deep. 
Wrecks float over its low shores. 

Van Chuch clings to a pile on the quay as the Thorn 
sheers away from the dockhead. White ripples wash be¬ 
tween. Those waters widen. 

1 1 You ’re mad, Anthony! ’’ van Chuch bellows. “No man 
would take her out with twenty hands below. And you 
have two. Don’t you know the ocean?” 

“Know ... it well!” drifts back the cry. Anthony 
stands at the wheel, his eyes straight ^head to the scourged 
horizons. “It tried to get me once . . . van Chuch. . . . 
But here I am! ’ ’ 

“Ay, there you’ll not be long!” growls van Chuch, wip¬ 
ing rain from his face. 

The Thorn’s engines spit contempt at destruction. 
River tides battle with it, giving it no headway. Red and 
green her sidelights. Masthead lights grow yellow 7 as dawn 
increases, as the dull day comes. Unbent to the winds An¬ 
thony stands, staring far out at the ocean. 

“Somewhere between here . . . and Malimus ... is 
Pete Lopez . . . I’ll get. ...” 

“Are you coming back?” screams van Chuch, cupping 
his hands and straining outward. “Are you coming back, 
Anthony ? ’ ’ 

“ . . . Back from Malimus . . . with Lopez. ... Tell 
Colonel Dawn. ...” 

“What?” shouts van Chuch. “0, this damned rain! 
I can’t hear!” 

“ . . . Tell Rose Dawn that when I . . . come 
back. ...” 

“I’m listening, Anthony! I get you, Anthony! Give 
me the message!” 


346 


ONCE IN A RED MOON 


Drowning winds. Lightning strikes a tree near shore. 
Blue smoke goes up, and the shriek of living wood. 

“ . . . Rose Dawn. ... If I do come back. . . . Tell 
her if I do . . . come back. . . .” 

What shall I tell her?” van Chuch bellows. “1 can 
lieai yet, Anthony! Anthony! Anthony ! Look at that 
tornado! Man, you’re raving crazy! Death—” 

{( is Anthony’s voice now. The wind tosses it. 

... Not fate I . . . should die this. . . . Not the utter 
ocean. ...” 

Howls the southeast wind. Van Chuch shouts again as 
a smash of storm almost topples him to the swirling waters. 
Trees crash. Van Chuch falls to his hands and knees, 
sprawling down the banks of the river. The Thorn rocks 

in the waters of the bay. She stands outward to the 
ocean. 

Past the storm clouds, which fly frantically north-north¬ 
west, comes beating up from out the whirlpools of the in¬ 
most Carib seas, from out the wastes impassable where 
winds have birth, the illimitable hurricane! The hurri¬ 
cane wind racing at two hundred miles an hour! The sky 
is ripped to tatters. On those threshing wings is born the 
wrath of the ungenerate void, the stark fury of the fates. 
Old ocean stands on edge, in a mighty cliff of waters. Old 
ocean shrieks; its bowels are ripped*from it. 

“ Anthony! Anthony! That’s death! What will I 
say— What will I say, Anthony, to Rose Dawn?” 

Whispers on the wind. Van Chuch does not know if 
they are words or silence. 

* * * ‘ Rose Dawn - • • • She is the Rose. ... I am the 
Thorn. . . . Good-by to her. . . . Good _” 

For hours van Chuch watched, his arms wrapped around 
a cracking palm. The Thorn had passed the keys. It was 
ground in the jaws of the deep. Oceans were above it 
deep as those oceans below. 

Now sparked its lights out. All sign of it was gone. 

Van Chuch knew some one stood beside him. Rain- 


NEW MOON 


347 


drenched, shuddering and sobbing, there stood Rose Dawn. 
Van Chuch threw his arm about her, for she seemed ready 
to leap into the waters. They were hurled to earth as 
the palm tree broke. 

“If he’s gone, I’ll go with him!” Rose sobbed. Over 
and over, while storm swept down the sky and floods of 
rain washed on them. “If he’s gone, I’ll go with him!” 

“Steady! Steady!” said van Chuch. “Easy all!” 

Within the night of noon the storm clouds broke. In 
the west shone one clear streak of blue, blue as the eyes of 
Rose Dawn. Upon that blue a curly crescent of pale 
stormy moon, yellow as the curls of Rose Dawn. 

The hurricane fled muttering away. From the sea a 
light. The Thorn was coming home! As the long hour 
passed, her white lean length was visible more clearly. 
Anthony stood yet at her wheel. 

Sturdily van Chuch patted the girl’s back, with heroic 
clumps. “Steady, girl! Easy all!” 

That upturned moon of noon, he saw, was like the up¬ 
turned lips of Rose Dawn. 


FINIS 








/ * 




























































































